Do what we do best
by RelightTheTorch
Summary: Roman Torchwick and Trifa. Not two people you would expect to be hanging about together. However, after circumstances come into play at the Battle of Beacon that neither of them could have expected, they've been forced to come together as equals. With Adam and the White Fang hot on their tails, their going to have to do what they do best, lie, steal, cheat and survive.
1. Reluctant Alliance

**Chapter 1: Reluctant Alliance**

**Credit for cover image goes to Gabrielle Verzosa over on Artstation. **

_**Do what we do best **_

"You've got spirit Red, but this is the real world!"

Roman smacked Ruby down.

Neo was dead, probably eaten by some Grimm.

He had no one left.

The one thing he had, had been taken away from him.

Neo had been his only light, his only friend.

And little Red had made that end.

"The real world is cold!"

The only thing he had now was the rage inside of him.

To make little Re-,

No, she didn't even deserve a nickname.

"The real world doesn't care about spirit!"

To make this pathetic little girl pay.

A kick to his leg. Painful, but not unexpected, so he easily caught himself.

"You want to be a hero? Then play the part and die just like every other huntsman in history!"

He hit her again, putting every last ounce of anger in his swing.

Roman Torchwick had Ruby Rose right where he wanted her.

Time to finish her off.

"As for me, I'll do what I do best. Lie, steal, cheat, and surv-"

A wall of white appeared in front of him, cutting him off from the world.

_Well, that was unexpected._

He had just been swallowed by a Grimm.

It was dark, very dark.

He fumbled around, trying to find his lighter so he could see.

Then, he lurched forward as the Griffon charged at Ruby.

She kicked it over the head, and it was sent crashing into the ship.

The body of the Grimm protected him, but he was still thrown about inside of it.

The Grimm began to disintegrate, and Roman was left lying on a exploding ship.

_I have to get off. _

He didn't even pay attention to Ruby, who was currently jumping off the airship.

An explosion threw him backwards.

He peered over the edge of the ship.

It was going down.

He was able to stand up, barely.

It was then Roman realised he had one choice.

If he was still on the ship when it crashed, he would die, aura or no aura.

So he did the most risky thing that he had every done in his long, criminal life. Actually, probably not.

Putting a hand on his hat to make sure it didn't go flying away, he picked Melodic Cugel up.

Then, he ran towards the edge of the ship, and jumped.

_**Do what we do best **_

Trifa had to get away.

Watching Yuma being killed by Adam right before her very eyes had been traumatizing.

The day before Beacon was due to fall, he had decided that he wanted nothing to do with the White Fang, believing them to be too violent.

He had made a run for it, and the Lieutenant had tracked him down, and brought him back to Adam.

Adam had called him a disgrace to their kind, and had stabbed him in the chest.

Trifa had considered Yuma a friend, and it was terrifying.

Adam had turned into a monster. He would never have hurt a Faunus before. But that had all changed.

She suspected it was something to do with the Belladonna girl leaving.

So, she had decided to sneak away in the chaos of the battle of Beacon.

Unfortunately, Adam had noticed her.

She knew he was following her, and soon a shot to the side of her forced her to turn around.

"You aren't running away like Blake, are you Trifa?"

Her breath was coming out in short gasps.

"Don't you remember what happened to Yuma?"

She was absolutely terrified.

"You have always been a exceptional help to the White Fang."

That was a lie. He was trying to convince her to come back.

"Which is why I am going to give you a choice. You can come back with us, and help with Beacon's demise. You will be rewarded handsomely."

"Leave me alone!"

"Or, you can continue to run. I won't chase after you. I have far more important matters to attend to. But rest assured, when Beacon has fallen, we will find you. The White Fang does not take to traitors lightly."

For a moment, she allowed herself to be tempted to come back.

But that thought was quickly dismissed.

She was going to run. As cowardly as it was, she was going to run.

Turning around, she began running as fast as she could.

Adam watched her go.

"Such a shame" he said to himself.

_**Do what we do best**_

Roman landed smack bang on the floor.

_Ow._

His aura had absorbed most of the fall, and he stood back up.

_I need to leave. Now._

There was chaos everywhere, students were fighting the Grimm, and Atlas soldiers were also fighting.

Suddenly, the red glow on their visors went away.

_Huh? _

The airship had been destroyed, but surely the virus would stay?

He didn't have time to dwell on that, as a couple of students had noticed him.

"Hey, it's Roman Torchwick!"

A boy with a trumpet in his hand, and his extremely colourful teammate turned to face him.

To his left was...

_Great. It's monkey boy._

But monkey boy wasn't focusing on him.

He seemed to have some kind of web wrapped around his arm.

Roman noticed Trifa running beside him, but he personally liked to call her 'Spider Girl'.

He had never talked to her much, only really when necessary.

Roman had never particularly liked the White Fang, or even Faunus in general. Some of them were alright, like Yuma. Roman had heard of his unfortunate death. Some of them were amazing, like Perry. But most of them were complete utter animals, like Adam.

Trifa... He wasn't quite sure where she fell in that. He hadn't interacted with her enough.

In fact, the only time he could remember talking to her was when she had helpfully told him that Red, Ice Queen, Kitty cat and Goldilocks were on the train.

Apparently, she had fought the Ice Queen, and lost.

Flynt Coal blew his trumpet, blasting Roman back.

Trifa's path got caught off by Sun and Neptune, and she was sent sprawling next to Roman.

They locked eyes for a second, and then they both stood up.

Sun, Neptune, Flynt, and Neon were waiting for them.

Looking behind them, there were Atlas soldiers blocking the way.

If they were going to get out of here alive, they would need to work together.

And they both knew it.

"We can't take them all on." Roman said under his breath, just loud enough for her to hear. "We need to cause a distraction, and make a break for it."

Trifa took her knife out of her pocket.

Roman looked around him, trying to find any possible distraction for him to use.

There were a few Grimm with their backs turned to them. It wasn't the best solution, but it would do.

He fired a shot next to them, causing them to turn around.

Neon skated past them, narrowly dodging a slash from Trifa's knife.

"Never miss a beat, never miss a-"

Roman grabbed her by the neck, and threw her away.

The Grimm jumped on Sun and Neptune, keeping them occupied.

The Atlas soldiers were trying to shoot them down, and Roman began ducking and weaving to dodge them.

Trifa webbed one of them up, and Roman blasted it, blowing it's head off.

He ducked underneath another shot, before he hit it in the back, and finished it up with a punch to the face.

Seeing an opening, Roman made a break for it.

The bullheads that Adam and the White Fang had arrived on were still here.

_**Do what we do best **_

Trifa followed after Roman, which she knew wasn't the best idea she had every had.

Roman wasn't exactly very popular among the Faunus.

While he didn't beat them like most would, he was known to call them harsh names.

But in reality, did she really have a choice?

She couldn't exactly go back to the White Fang.

She wasn't as infamous as Adam, so she would probably be able to blend in to modern society, but what would she do?

She had no lien, her family wouldn't take her back, and she didn't have any contacts.

But Roman probably had two of those of things.

Sticking with him was really her only option.

She didn't like it, but she had no other choice.

_**Do what we do best**_

Roman jumped onto the bullhead, and began to take off.

There were Atlas soldiers raining down fire on him, and he opened a window and poked Melodic Cugel out of it and returned fire. He was successful in taking most of them out.

The bullhead took off, and he piloted it away from Beacon.

He allowed himself a moment to relax. He had escaped.

_But Neo didn't... _

The whole ordeal hit him like a tidal wave of emotions.

He put the bullhead into auto-pilot, putting it on course to one of his apartments he had bought.

Then he swivelled around in his chair, and lowered his head in his hands.

She was dead. Neo was dead.

He didn't realise he was crying until the tears stung his eyes.

She had been there for him through everything.

Every robbery, every meeting, every moment of each waking hour.

She had been there.

Now she was gone.

_**Do what we do best **_

Hanging underneath a bullhead wasn't the most ordinary method of transport, but it would do for now.

Just before Roman had taken off, she had managed to web herself underneath the bullhead, and was now hanging on for dear life.

She shut her eyes, and took a breath.

Now, time to find a way in.

Like the female version of Spider Man, she crawled her way up to one of the windows, and began banging on it.

"Hey, can you let me in please?"

He didn't hear her, or he chose to ignore her.

Sighing, she shot some webs onto her legs, in case she lost her grip trying to get it open.

She took one of her hands off, and began fiddling with the latch of the window.

She couldn't get it opened though.

Holding onto it firmly, she let her other hand go free, and tried her best to open it.

Still wasn't budging.

She drew out her knife, put it in the latch, and began pulling it as hard as she could.

Then, her hand suddenly slipped and the knife went flying away, and all of a sudden she was thrown back, the webbing on her legs the only thing preventing her from falling into oblivion.

Gritting her teeth, she pulled herself back up, and was just about to try again, when she realised...

_Probably would be easier to just smash it, huh? _

Harnessing her aura, she punched the window.

It hurt a bit, but there was a noticeable crack.

Drawing her fist back again, she hit it again.

This time it smashed.

Tumbling through the window, she smacked right into Roman, knocking him over.

"What's the big deal?!"

_**Do what we do best**_

Neo had managed to float down safetly, narrowly avoiding being eaten by a Grimm a few times.

She had watched as the airship had crashed, praying that Roman had survived.

She had been frantically texting him for the past while.

_Roman? Are you there? _

_Did you beat Red yet? _

_Roman? _

_The airship just crashed! Text me now! _

_If this is some kind of a joke, it isn't funny! _

_Roman, please..._

_Just tell me your okay..._

_Please..._

_I don't want to lose you..._

But still no response.

There was still hope though. Maybe he had lost his scroll getting off. He would come and find her.

Because he always did.

Half a hour passed. Then another. He didn't come.

She gave him a hour, he would be here within a hour.

He wasn't there within a hour.

Then that must mean...

She began to sob.

Curling herself up into a ball on the ground, she wept for what felt like forever.

Her negative emotions drew a pack of Grimm to her location.

She faced them with tear stained eyes as they charged.

_They took Roman..._

She took her blade out of her parasol.

_I'll take their lives..._

...

**Poor Neo. I feel terrible for her in the original. **

**This was originally supposed to be a Roman centric fic. But then I decided, why not throw my favourite one off character in there? **

**The idea for a spider Faunus is a great one. **

**So, this is how this is going to work.**

**Mainly Trifa and Roman centred, with a Neo scene every once in a while. **

**Unlike the show, there will be no timeskip to Vol 4. We'll be picking up right where we left off. **

**Adam and the White Fang are going to be the main antagonists. **

**Thanks for reading and have a good day! **


	2. First meeting

**Chapter 2: First meeting**

**There is a bit of a timeskip between the Roman/Trifa scene, and the Adam one.**

_**Do what we do best **_

"Well, Spider Girl, that's certainly one way to make a entrance. What's the occasion?"

"My name's Trifa. Not spider girl."

"I'm aware, but Spider Girl has more of a ring to it, wouldn't you agree? Same as "Perry" and "bull boy, and my personal favourite, "big hulking man with big chainsaw."

"They have names you know."

"Enlighten me then."

"I know Perry's real name is Anthony. No one knows the Lieutenants real name."

"Anthony? Perry sounds better. Same way as spider girl sounds better than Trifa."

"I hate it. Don't call me that."

"Unless you would rather I shorten your name even further and call you Tri or Fa?"

"Just don't give me a nickname."

"Everyone needs a nickname. Mines is Candlewick. My previous sidekick, Neapolitan, she was called N-"

He stopped suddenly, and took a deep breath.

"Never mind that. Anyway, if you plan on sticking around, I need to call you something."

"Trifa."

"But that's so uncreative. How about-"

"I don't want a nickname."

She didn't mind the idea of a nickname. It was just due to his discriminatory nature, she was worried he would pick a really racist one.

"Come on now. I even called my enemy "Red". If you don't want something relating to your Faunus heritage, how about the colour of your hair? How does blue sound?"

"Uh, I hate that even more."

"Well, what do you expect me to do then?"

"I except you to call me Trifa!" She snapped at him.

He raised his hands in defence.

"It's only a nickname, no need to get so mad. Why are you Faunus so sensitive about everything?"

"Decades of being tortured will do that to a race, Candlew-" She stopped herself.

Roman grinned.

"See, you were just about to call me Candlewick, weren't you?"

"Wasn't."

"What is your problem? Why can't I just give you a nickname?"

"Why can't you just call me Trifa?" She shot back.

"I've already told you! It's standard protocol for me to give people a nickname."

He began looking through some of the drawers.

"Pen and paper, pen and paper, aha!"

He found some paper, and took the lid off the pen.

"So spider girl is a no. Blue is a no."

He began thinking.

Trifa was beginning to get annoyed. Was it really so hard just to call someone by their name?

"For the love of everything Roman, why can't you just use my name?"

"You do know I'm not giving up here, don't you? I will call you something other than Trifa."

She sighed. What a waste of time.

"Oh, how about spider women?"

"No."

"Tarantula girl? Wait, aren't spiders and tarantula's the same thing?"

"They come from the same family, although tarantula's are usually bigger."

"Right, thanks for clearing that up. So, yes or no?"

"No."

He began tapping his foot.

"I can't really think of..."

Then he seemed to straighten up a bit.

"I've got it."

"What?"

"Archane."

"Come again?"

"Because, a arachnid is a spider, but we add a e to make the name."

Trifa had to admit, it was pretty catchy. And she was getting tired of this...

"That'll do."

"See, did that hurt anyone?"

She rolled her eyes.

Roman was actually surprising her a bit. No discriminatory comments, no racist remarks, nothing.

Maybe he wasn't so bad.

"So then, why did you follow me exactly?"

"I needed to get away. From the White Fang. I'm sure you heard about what happened to Yuma."

"A shame, he was actually one of the more competent members of the White Fang."

She stiffened a bit.

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"The White Fang are certainly not the best workforce I've ever had. I've had worse, Junior is a good example of that. But some of the White Fang are absolute morons. And I promise, that's not me being racist, but surely you must have noticed. I remember at the docks, one of them asked me if the tow cables were leashes. Can you believe it?"

Trifa didn't respond. He sighed.

"Look, I know I'm probably the last person you want to be with. And I know I've called members of the White Fang, some pretty harsh things. But I swear, I'm not that racist. Maybe a bit, but definitely not to the extent of someone like Jacques Schnee. I can just, get a bit frustrated with them sometimes."

Should she believe him? He might be telling the truth.

No one had every reported Roman openly attacking a Faunus.

But then there was Adam. His influence might have scared Roman into not attacking them.

Adam wasn't here though. And Roman hadn't hit her, or ordered the 'dirty animal' out. He was probably treating her the same way he treated all his contacts.

She took a deep breath.

"Alright. I'll believe you. For now."

"Now we'll get along fine."

Trifa stared out the window, and she saw Beacon in the distance, the Wyvern still on the very top, continuing to bring Grimm to Beacon.

_Rest assured, we will find you..._

That kept playing in her head.

Adam had threatened to come after her, and he usually stayed true to his threats.

She and Roman needed to get out of Vale.

Just when she was considering where they could go, the bullhead lurched to the side.

"Watch where your-"

Then she realised.

There was a flock of Grimm flying after them.

"Now, those are animals!" Roman said. "Hold tight, I'm going to try and lose them!"

The bullhead was brought into a dive, as Roman swerved left and right, trying to throw the Grimm off their tail.

They were persistent though, and refused to let up.

He went in between two buildings, the Grimm still right behind.

"You won't catch me this time, feather faces!"

"LOOK OUT!"

"Oh no!"

He brought it up into a steep climb, barely dodging a house.

They continued to go up, until they were above the clouds.

"Did we finally lose-"

Two Griffons and a Nevermore came into sight.

Unfortunately, the Grimm seemed to be faster than the bullhead.

The Nevermore shed it's feathers, sending them flying into the top of the bullhead.

The two Griffons smashed into the side of it, sending it to the right.

The Nevermore dove into the top of it, pushing it down.

"Trifa, can you-"

He was cut off by a alarm sounding.

She didn't have her knife, so she wasn't going to be much help.

She could still try though.

"Roman, can I borrow your cane?"

"No chance! If you need a weapon, take this!"

He threw a knife to her.

She jumped onto the roof, and opened the hatch.

Climbing onto the top of the bullhead, she shot a web over to one of the Griffons, latching onto it's face, and she jumped off and swung over it to it.

Landing on it's face, she stabbed the knife into it's necks, and it writhed about in pain.

Jumping onto it's back, she continued to stab it, until she leapt off and swung to the next one.

Repeating the process, she eventually made her way to the Nevermore.

It seemed ready for her though, and it ripped her web in half, sending her falling back onto the bullhead.

"Mayday! We're going down!" She heard Roman shout.

She was able to slip back into the bullhead, hoping that the exterior would provide some protection.

That proved futile, as the bullhead went down nose first, causing them both to go flying out the window that Trifa had broken, and out into the open sky.

They were both skydiving now.

But neither of them were screaming, for most people, this was a near death experience, but for Roman and Trifa, a crime lord and a ex-member of a terrorist organisation, this was a Tuesday.

Trifa pulled Roman over to her with her webs, and they both held on to each other as they spiralled through the air.

They seemed to be heading for the top of a mountain.

The bullhead had already crashed, creating smoke and fire.

Luckily, they seemed to be a fair distance away from it.

They weren't too far from the ground now. Just as they were about to become a stain on the floor, Trifa slowed their descent by webbing two trees either side of them, but they broke and they continued to fall.

They both hit the floor, gasping for breath.

"That's certainly one way to land." Roman said. "Man, those webs of yours are useful. Spider Faunus are now officially my new favourite type of Faunus."

Trifa held her left arm. She had landed on it pretty hard.

"Ouch." She winced.

"You alright?"

"I've been better."

Roman surveyed their surroundings.

"It would appear we are on the top of a very, very high mountain."

There was a fierce wind up here too.

"How high are we talking here?"

"See for yourself."

She peeked over the edge.

Suffice to say, it was extremely high.

"How do we get down there?"

_**Do what we do best**_

Adam was standing with the White Fang, after the Fall of Beacon.

"Sir" The Lieutenant said. "You are aware that our high leader Sienna Khan is not going to be happy? We lost a lot of men to both the student's and the Grimm."

"Sienna Khan has lead our people for many years now. And she has lead them well. However, she does not believe we can win a war against the human's. That is where she is wrong. We can win a war against the human's. We have everything they have and more. She will not be pleased, but I assure you, we are doing what is right for the Faunus. "

He smirked.

"I believe it's time a new high leader took her spot."

"You plan to overthrow her, how?" One his men asked.

"There are already people who believe that I am the true high leader. All we have to do is spread the message a little."

"So, are you going to kill her?"

"Now, why would I do that? She will remain loyal to our cause. The only difference being, I will be the one leading it."

A couple of airships who were taking them back to their base of operations.

"We will depose of the feeble cowards. The traitors of the White Fang will be cut down."

"It's time we got what we deserve."

_**Do what we do best **_

**Thanks for reading and have a good day! **


	3. Alone again

**Chapter 3: Alone again**

Roman and Trifa were currently in the process of climbing back down.

If Trifa was by herself, this wouldn't be a problem. Just use her Archane abilities to climb down.

However, she had to account for Roman too, who was a bit slower.

The mountain was extra high up and progress was slow, as Trifa had to climb next to him to prevent him from falling.

He almost had a couple of times, but was always able to save himself.

"Can't you hurry it up already?" Trifa asked.

"I'm a human. I can't attach myself to walls like you can, and if I fall, I'm a goner."

Trifa knew it was a bit unfair to expect him to be able to climb down really fast.

But that didn't stop her from getting impatient.

Not to mention, she was freezing. The wind had really picked up, and it kept biting into her skin. She was still wearing her White Fang uniform, exposing her arms, which she kept hugging to her chest.

"It's freezing up here."

"Really? I hadn't noticed."

She couldn't help but roll her eyes.

"Probably should have worn some warmer clothes then, how's that for a idea?"

"This is the uniform I was given, and basically told to wear."

"Well, when I get down from here, the first thing I am going to do is buy you some new clothes. Maybe get some hair dye too."

He climbed down onto a ledge.

"Right, I'm going to stop here for a moment."

She jumped down beside him, and sat down.

"So, why did you decide to leave the White Fang then?"

"None of your business."

"Alright then."

He fumbled around in his coat pocket.

"Oh, my lighter is still here, surprisingly. And my cigars."

Trifa peered down over the ledge.

They had made more progress than she originally thought, but there was still a long way to go.

_**Do what we do best**_

Neo was on the streets again.

Forced back to where she was before Roman found her.

Alone, cold and hungry.

Now, it helped that she had discovered her semblance, and had her parasol to defend herself with against anyone who dared try and attack her, but she was still utterly miserable.

She had been eavesdropping on people's conversations, trying to find out if there was any possible rumours that Roman was still alive.

But nothing.

So there she lay, with a small box in front of her, for people to put money into.

She had used her semblance to transform herself into a depiction of a homeless person, but hardly anyone took pity on her.

It was all Cinders fault that Roman had died. She knew she should go after her. The only problem was, she hadn't a clue where to look.

Which is why she spent most of her days walking about the streets, hoping that someone, anyone, would maybe take her in, give her a nice hot meal, a bed to sleep in.

It wouldn't be as good as what Roman had gave her, but it was better than this.

She looked inside her box, and there was still nothing.

Sighing inwardly, she picked it up, and threw it back into the bin.

She couldn't even cry over him, all the tears had been wept the day that Beacon had fell.

"Oh, what do we have here?"

She looked up. There were three men standing over her. They were all grinning.

"What's wrong little girl? Don't have a home to go back to? Serves you right. What a pathetic thing you are."

Then he hit her, and laughed.

One of them drew back a baseball bat and began assaulting her with it.

She didn't care, didn't have the energy to fight back. So she just took it on the chin for what seemed like forever.

She had been subjected to far worse than this. But they wouldn't stop.

They didn't get bored, didn't get tired. Just kept going.

And they were laughing about it. Beating on a little girl, and laughing about it.

And Neo thought she was psychopathic.

"Have you been a street rat all of your life? I wouldn't be surprised. I mean, only a complete fool would want to be friends with you."

Something snapped inside of her. They had insulted him. They had called Roman a fool.

That was it. That was where she drew a line.

And she wasn't going to lie here and take their beatings anymore.

She was Neo. That was the name he had given her. And she was going to honour him with every last breath she took.

She brought her foot up and deflected the next shot. Time to show them who they were messing with here. She grabbed her parasol, and knocked them all back with a swing of it.

"Hey, what are you-Urk!"

She stabbed him, driving her blade deeper and deeper into his chest. When she drew it out, she turned to the other two, who were fleeing.

She wasn't going to let them get away. Not like she had let Cinder and Ruby get away. Chasing after them, she kicked one of them in the head, knocking him down. She lowered her blade to his throat.

"Please-!"

That was the last word he every spoke as she killed him with a slash to the throat.

The last one had grabbed a piece of metal to try and defend himself with. Swinging it at her, she deflected it and smirked at him.

"What, what are you?"

He swung at her again, only for her to shatter into glass. He looked around, panicked, before she wrapped her arm around his throat and cut his neck.

They were all dead now. And Neo envisioned doing that to Cinder and Ruby, and how good it would feel. To know that she had finally taken her revenge. But first, she had to find out where they were.

There was one information broker she knew of in Vale. And that was Junior.

And if he didn't know where they were, she would track them down herself. She didn't matter how long it took. She would find them. And she would end their lives, even if it meant she died herself. They had took away her dum dum.

She would make them pay.

_**Do what we do best **_

"Adam Taurus, you dare to walk into my throne room, and tell me that Beacon was a victory?! You went forward with this attack, without my blessing, and expect me to pity you? You are a fool. A complete utter fool. You always said that you were doing what was best for the Faunus. Well, allow me to inform you, this helps the Faunus in no way shape or form! And now you tell me that we have to hunt down the traitor?" Sienna Khan glared at Adam.

"That I am. We can't let her or Blake get away."

"We lost a lot of our forces at Beacon, and you think I'm really going to put my efforts into tracking down two people?"

"We need to punish them!"

"The only person who should be punished here is you! Which is why, from now on, you will no longer be leading the White Fang in Vale. I will have the Lieutenant take your place."

"High leader, I am begging you. Don't do this."

"I can, and I just did."

She paused and her tone became more somber.

"What happened to you Adam? Once, you believed in nothing but equality for the Faunus. And here you are now, trying to cause a war which we cannot win? All you seem to care about now is revenge on Blake. You need to let it go. It saddens me, that someone who I once would have called a friend, has went down such a dark path."

She sighed.

"Take him away."

The guards came down and lead him out.

He was greeted by the Lieutenant, Corsac and Fennec.

When the guards had left, he turned to them.

"What are our orders sir?" The Lieutenant asked.

"Gather all my supporters from Vale. Let them know that Sienna Khan is no longer fit to lead the White Fang."

"What will you do?" Corsac asked.

"I will stay here, and convince everyone here that I am the true high leader."

"And then?"

"Then, we overthrow Sienna Khan, and strike back against the humans."

"It's time we rise."

_**Do what we do best **_

The bottom of the mountain was finally coming into sight.

But there was a problem. No more rocks were jutting out, effectively giving Roman no way to climb down.

"Roman, I have a idea."

"I'm listening."

"You jump off-"

"Eh, no?"

"I wasn't finished. See those trees down there? I can then do the same thing I did when we landed at the top of the mountain, create a net out of webs which you land in."

Roman wasn't sure. The idea of plummeting down at a extremely fast speed, hoping that a bunch of webs would save his life, wasn't very appealing.

"I'm not sure…"

"Unless you have any other ideas?"

That was the problem. He didn't.

"Just trust me with this, okay?"

"Go on then."

She leapt down off the side of the mountain, and landed nimbly on a tree.

She looked up at him. She created the net, and then shouted up to him "It's ready!"

"I can see that!" He shouted back.

"Why am I doing this?" He muttered to himself. "I must be crazy."

He jumped off. He almost missed it, but was able to land in it. It stretched down, and for a moment, Roman thought it would fling him back up like a trampoline, but he stayed stuck. Then he realised, he couldn't get out.

"Uh, a little help please?"

She jumped up, and began untangling him.

"Was spider silk always this strong?"

"It can stop bullets when woven together."

"Hm, that is pretty strong."

Trifa didn't know why, but she was happy that he was taking a interest in these things.

"Do you catch flies in these?"

"If I wanted to, yeah."

"Do you eat them?"

"Used to. Don't anymore though."

Roman gagged.

"That's disgusting! Are all Faunus like that?"

"Pretty much, yeah. Most of them just tend to eat normal food though."

Roman suddenly had a image of Blake chasing mice about in his head, and quickly tried to dismiss it.

"What do flies, um, taste like?"

"They taste nice to me. To you, they would probably taste disgusting."

When she had untangled him, he stood up and peered into the distance.

"It's quite a trek back to Vale. We should start moving."

"Okay."

As they began walking, Roman found his thoughts being dragged back to Neo. He tried his hardest not to think about her, but it was difficult.

He also found himself thinking about little Red, and what she was doing. Hopefully dying in a hole somewhere.

Well, at least there was Archane now. He still think he deserved at least a pat on the back for that name.

She wasn't too bad, didn't seem like most of the White Fang, who were all "Oh, let's just assume every human is racist and kill them all. That was one of the reasons he didn't like them. They went after everybody, not just ones in the Schnee Dust Company, but everyone.

He had heard rumours that Atlas was still using Faunus labour, and he couldn't help but hope that wasn't true. Just another reason on his list to hate the Schnee Dust Company.

He looked at Trifa.

He was definitely going to buy her some new clothes. The White Fang obviously had no taste in style.

_**Do what we do best **_

**I dunno Roman, Adam and Sienna look pretty cool. **

**Thanks for reading and have a good day!**


	4. Wardrobe change

**Chapter 4: Wardrobe change **

_**Do what we do best**_

"Right, time for our first order of business. We are getting you some new clothes."

Trifa looked down at herself. She was in need of a serious change. Her current ones were all ripped and torn, and she didn't even want to imagine the state her hair was in.

"Okay, so where are we going then?"

"To a clothes store."

"But we're criminals. We can't exactly just walk into a clothes store."

"I'm a criminal? That's news to my ears. I thought I was a slightly dangerous wanted man."

Trifa rolled her eyes, but she couldn't help smiling. "So, what are we going to do?"

"I have a old contact. He made my coat and my hat for me. We can go to him."

"And where would he be located?"

"About twenty miles that direction." He pointed in front of him with his finger. Trifa's eyes widened.

"No, we're not walking it."

"Where are we going to get a ride?"

"We are going to steal one."

"Where from?"

Roman shrugged. "Anywhere we can find one."

"Anywhere?"

"Yep. If we need to run into the car park of a supermarket, we run into the car park of a supermarket."

"And how do you plan on stealing one?"

Roman grinned. "Using some good old lockpicking."

They renentered Vale.

"Right, we're going to have to hangout about the outskirts, if we walk right into the main city, we'll be recognised. There might be some Grimm lurking about thanks to the Fall of Beacon, so keep your eyes peeled."

Trifa nodded and they began to walk about. It wouldn't be too hard to find a car, they were literally everywhere.

They walked through a narrow alley, and came to a small set of houses.

Parked outside one of them, was a nice black car, like it had only been bought yesterday.

"Rich brats flashing the cash. Let's steal that."

They walked across the street. Luckily, no one seemed to be around. Roman got to work picking the car lock.

Trifa looked around her. There wasn't a single soul in sight, Faunus or human. It was kind of scary. The Grimm had killed so many people.

She noticed a light come on in a upstairs window.

"Roman..."

He began to work faster. "Bloody thing, why won't it come out?"

Growling in frustration, Roman smashed the window with his cane. The car alarm was set off. "Get in, now!"

Trifa jumped through the window, her smaller stature allowing her to slip in.

Someone threw open the door, and began yelling at them. He drew a sword from his belt.

"Great, a huntsman! Just what we need!"

He drew out his cane and shot him, knocking him back. If he was a huntsman, he was a very incompetent one, as the shot had knocked him out.

The car alarm was still blaring. Roman fumbled through the man's pocket, and found a keychain.

He jumped into the car.

A few Grimm had been drawn to the sound of the car alarm.

Roman began trying the different keys.

"Not that one, not that one..."

"Wicky!"

"What?!"

"Roman!"

"No, Wicky is fi-"

"A GRIMM IS ABOUT TO JUMP ONTO THE CAR!"

"Got it!"

The car started and Roman ran over the Grimm.

"Now, let's hope we don't encounter anything, Grimm or otherwise."

They continued on.

Trifa looked out the window. She hadn't realised the damage the Grimm caused. There were houses lying in ruins, people lying dead in the streets and she even saw a mother crying over her dead kid.

And that was before they had even got to Beacon...

_Why do I care? I never went to Beacon. _

She cared because so many people had died, humans included.

Human's...

The one's who had discriminated against them for so long. The one's who she was supposed to be killing. Yet here she was, sat with one. Wasn't this going against everything she had been taught? She shouldn't care. In fact, she should be happy.

But she wasn't like Adam. Once, she had agreed in the violence. Relished it. But after seeing what Adam had become...

She couldn't go on. She still wanted equality, but she wasn't willing to slaughter a entire race to make that happen.

Adam was. He was delusional, how did he think they were supposed to win a war against the human's? The Faunus may have the advantage naturally thanks to their Faunus traits, but the human's outnumbered them and they also had far superior weapons. There was no hope in hell that they would be able to win. Not to mention, not all human's were discriminatory towards Faunus. She knew that first hand.

And it wasn't like every human deserved to die. Some humans were non racist.

She was pretty sure that Roman wasn't racist. He would have done something by now, said something.

_What if he's roping you in? Pretending to care before discarding you._

But then why would he be offering to buy her new clothes? If he really didn't care, he would have left her the moment they got to the bottom of the cliff. It was strange, and Trifa couldn't figure it out.

She was so lost in thought, that she didn't even realise Roman was speaking to her.

"- and he's a nice enough guy, we shouldn't be too far from his place now."

"What?"

Roman looked at her. "Have you been listening to a word I just said?"

"No, sorry. I was lost in thought."

He sighed. "What I was saying, was that after we get you your clothes, we'll need to start thinking about how we're going to leave Vale. We can't stay here, with all these Grimm and the Atlas military potentially lurking about."

"Where would we go?"

"I wouldn't want to go to Vacuo, too sandy, too hot. Mistral would probably be our best option. We could sneak onto a boat or a plane."

"Alright."

"We're not too far now. I'd guess about five miles."

_**Do what we do best **_

"Thank you everyone for gathering here today."

Adam had managed to arrange a meeting in a remote part of their hideout. With Sienna Khan out to talk to the Lieutenant, this was a good opportunity.

"Now, you are all probably wondering why I have called you here today. Well, allow me to explain. Sienna Khan has lead our people well. She was here in their time of need. But, there always comes a point where a leader has to step down, to allow a new one to take over."

"But the problem is, she won't step down. She believes that even after all this time, she is still capable of leading our people. I have tried my best to convince her otherwise, but she is stubborn. She won't listen."

"Which is why, if she won't step down, we'll have to make her. We'll need to lead our own revolution. We need to overthrow her. The humans have discriminated against us for far too long. It's time we take what is ours."

"I believe that I am the true leader of the White Fang. And lots of our people believe that too. But if we are too overthrow Sienna Khan, we need more support. We need your support. So, are you ready to strike back against the humans?"

A couple of Faunus began to cheer, but some remained quiet.

"I am sure there are those among with with your doubts. But trust me, we can win a war against the humans. We have what they have and more."

Adam took a step forward.

"Humans shouldn't just fear the Faunus, they should serve us."

There were still murmurs amongst the crowd.

That's when Adam revealed his trump card. He took off his mask, exposing the brand scarred onto his face. Gasps could be heard.

"Do you see this? This is what they did to me! This is the work of the humans! This is the fate of so many Faunus! I'm sure you've heard of the rumours circling around, that there is still Faunus labour going on in Atlas. We need to stop that. We need to put a end to it. And the only way we are going to do that is to slaughter as many humans as possible."

More Faunus began to cheer.

"Do you see now? Do you see how they've tortured us for so long? Do you now stand with me?"

The cheers grew louder, they were chanting Adam's name.

"Now, allow me to introduce my second hand personnel, who will be assisting with this alongside the Lieutenant."

He motioned to the side.

A women walked on. She was a crocodile Faunus, and she had green scales all over her body and face. She smiled, and she had sharp metal teeth with two metal screws in them. She carried a large stopwatch.

"Alright there Adam?"

"This is Tock. She is a bounty hunter that comes from Vacuo. She will be assisting us in our quest for equality. I believe that she will be a great addition to the new White Fang."

"I must say, those outfits your all wearing are awfully boring. Haven't you ever considered sprucing things up a little?"

"So," Adam said, ignoring Tock's comment. "I think that about concludes everything. Over the next few weeks, we will continue to gather support, and soon, I will take my rightful position as the leader of the White Fang."

People began to leave the room. Adam turned to Tock.

"I need you to lie low. Sienna can't know your here."

"Don't worry about it Adam dear. I know what I need to do."

She smiled at him and walked away.

_**Do what we do best **_

Roman was talking to his contact, called Greg, at the front. Trifa was browsing through the different clothes.

"People are assuming your dead." Greg said.

"I'm that annoying cockroach who just won't die."

Greg laughed. "True, very true."

Trifa wasn't a big fan of any of the clothes on sale, and wondered if he would do a custom design, and if Roman would be willing to pay the extra.

She walked over to the counter. "Hey, do you do like, custom outfits?"

"Sure, I do. Have a idea in mind?"

"Yeah."

"Alright, come on then."

Roman took out a cigar and began to smoke.

Greg took her into a room with all sorts of fabric, and sowing machines and stuff like that.

"So, what are you thinking?"

Trifa described the outfit to him.

"I can do that. First, you'll need to pick a fabric."

_**Do what we do best **_

Roman couldn't help admiring the clothes that Greg had made. He now remembered why he had came to him for his outfit.

Browsing through a few of his clothes, he remembered the day he had brought Neo here to get her outfit made. She had wanted a outfit similar to his, but he had encouraged her to get something different.

He wondered what Neo would think of Trifa. She would have a fun time with her.

Speaking of Trifa, Roman was glad that she had come with him. It gave him someone to talk to, at least he wasn't alone now that Neo was dead.

Roman wasn't particularly known for forming close relationships with the people he worked for, but Neo had been different. He had taken her off the streets and given her a home, like adopting a child.

He would never be as close to Trifa as he had been to Neo, since she would probably ultimately leave in the end when she didn't need him anymore, but they could at the very least establish some form of friendship.

That would be nice. Regardless of the fact she was a Faunus.

He had been quite surprised when she asked for a custom outfit, he had just expected her to pick something up, and be done with it. Maybe she had better taste than he originally thought.

So long as it didn't cost far too much, he was willing to pay.

_**Do what we do best **_

Greg had retreated back into his room to make it, after taking a few measurements of her, claiming that he didn't like people watching him while he worked, which she supposed was fair enough.

She could hear the whir of the machines as he worked, and hoped that it would look good on her.

Roman poked his head in to find her sitting there. "Has he started?"

"Yeah."

"Alright." He walked in.

"When did you meet Greg?"

"Years ago. I heard of him when I was gaining fame as a criminal, and decided to come to him, expecting to have to threaten him, but apparently he was cool with working with criminals. He claimed that criminals usually had men, meaning several outfits would have to be made, and he would get more money as a result."

"I wasn't a big fan of those clothes outside, but they were well made."

"He told me that he's been doing this since he was a child. It's his passion."

"Cool."

They sat there, waiting for him to finish.

**A few hours later: **

"Right, it's done. Come on in and try it on."

Trifa walked in. Roman wondered what she had chosen.

A few minutes later, she walked in.

Trifa was now wearing a grey jacket, underneath it was a black shirt with the image of a blue spider on it, surrounded by webs. On the back of the jacket was the same symbol. She also was now wearing black pants with silver accents and a pair of boots with the same colour scheme.

"Looking pretty spiffy Archane." Roman grinned. "Now that your out of the White Fang, your fashion sense shows."

"That's some of my finest work yet." Greg commented.

"Roman said you were good, but I didn't realise how good."

They walked through to the counter.

"How much will it be?" Roman asked. He pulled out his wallet, still somehow intact after everything that had happened.

"That'll be about…"

Trifa honestly couldn't have been happier with it. It was made of tougher stuff than her White Fang uniform, and it had zip up pockets! How bad could a piece of clothing really be if it had zip up pockets? No more worrying about her stuff falling out!

Once Roman had paid, they bid farewell to Greg and headed out.

_**Do what we do best **_

**Tick Tock Feed the Croc. **

**Thanks for reading and have a good day!**


	5. A new arsenal

**Chapter 5: A new arsenal**

With a brand new set of clothes, and a brand new outlook, Trifa was feeling pretty good all things considered. Now all she needed was a weapon of some description…

Luckily, Roman had a contact for that too. The guy who had made his cane was called Jace and they were on his way to his place now. She had never had a custom made weapon before, like those Beacons students she had seen swinging them about the place. She was ecstatic. It could literally be anything she wanted!

A knife revolver!

A rapier!

A shotgun!

A war-hammer! _Snuff that one out Trifa, your not exactly very strong. _

That was the only restriction. She was actually relatively weak for a Faunus her age, so swinging around a huge axe or hammer wouldn't do her any favours.

If anything, she probably wouldn't even be capable of lifting it.

"So, any ideas? I plan to be in and out as quick as possible."

"I'm not sure… There's so many different choices I could make."

"For someone your size and strength, I would recommend something small, that doesn't restrict your movement, and allows quick and fluid attacks. It's up to you though."

Maybe a whip or something? So many choices… They were going to be spending a long time in here at this rate.

_I hope Torch doesn't mind. _

They pulled up outside what appeared to be a old garage.

"This doesn't look like a weapons shop…"

"It's not exactly legal what he's doing here."

"Oh."

They both walked in, and were greeted with a rather unpleasant looking man with a lot of tattoos and a lot of piercings. He looked like the type of person which mothers told their kids about so they wouldn't get out of bed at night.

"What do you want?" He said very gruffly.

Roman pointed to Trifa. "She needs a new weapon."

"Come on through then girlie."

Trifa decided not to comment on the fact that he called her "girlie." She followed him into the dirty workshop.

It was definitely not as neat or organised as Greg's place had been, there was an anvil sitting in the middle of the room, and a bunch of of weapons that had already been made were hanging on the walls.

"Let's get started then."

"Can I have a bit of time to look first?"

"Fine. Don't spend too long looking."

She wondered what to choose. She definitely wanted a ranged and melee option, that was certain.

A bow and arrow would be nice, but the thought of having to constantly carry it around on her back was a big no.

Two knife revolvers would have to do. If she asked nice enough, he might put a design of a spider on it.

_**Do what we do best **_

Junior was getting ready to open his club for the night. Every since the battle of Beacon, business hadn't been great. That was probably due to all the people that had been killed. They had just hid in here while the Grimm swarmed Vale.

If he didn't make enough money to keep his club open, they might have to close it down and leave Vale. It was a scary, but very likely possibility.

Two of his men walked forward and opened the doors, signalling that it was open. Melanie and Milita stood next to Junior, as they waited to see if anyone would come in.

Surprisingly, someone did.

Neo came striding up to Junior. She drew out her scroll and set it down in front of him. On it were two girls Junior had never seen before. One was of a girl in red swinging a scythe, and the other one one was of a women in a red dress.

"Do you want me to-"

She pointed at them again. Her face was rather passive.

"Look, I've never seen those two before, okay? Now, do you want to buy a drink, or-"

She picked up her scroll and shoved it in his face.

"I already told you! I've never-"

She drew her parasol out of her pocket, and pointed the blade at him.

"Woah, calm down. I can't help you, okay?"

Neo's face turned to one of extreme frustration, and she drew the blade back, only for the twins to start advancing on her. Neo turned to them, put her blade back into her parasol, and readied herself.

The twins made the first move, as Melanie tried to kick Neo in the face. Junior quickly stepped back and ran to find his rocket launcher.

Neo felt a wave of anger rush through her. This was supposed to be her guy, who would tell her everything she needed to know. Maybe killing his two bouncers would help jog his memory a bit.

Milita lashed out with her claws, which Neo deflected with ease. Melanie came in from the side, and Neo countered her strike with a kick to the stomach. She jumped over their heads, and proceeded to punch Milita in the face, before countering a double team attack with a perfectly timed block, and another kick to the head.

With both the twins down, Neo took this opportunity to put her blade to Melanie's throat, and slowly pulled her back up. Melanie tried to fight out, but Neo pressed down, drawing a thin line of blood.

Neo slowly drew her finger across her throat, signalling what would happen to her if Milita tried to attack.

"Junior already told you! He doesn't know where they are! Why are you doing this?"

Neo simply smiled, a cruel, devoid of any happiness smile.

Junior remerged from the back, drawing his weapon, and fired at Neo, who let go and rolled to the side. Gritting her teeth, she began running over to him, dodging his follow up shots. Just as she was about to jump him, one of Junior's henchmen, they had all been hiding during the fight, bravely ran up to her and swung, catching her off guard and sending her through a table. She quickly jumped back up, and she very simply threw her blade at him, killing him instantly.

Junior's expression went from shock to anger as he charged at Neo, hitting her twice, before Neo brought up her parasol, knocking it out of his hand. She slid beneath his legs, grabbed her blade, and before he could react, she leapt on him, bringing him to the ground, and just as she was about to kill him, the twins reentered the fight. Neo leapt back to avoid their strikes, and she picked up a bottle of alcohol that was lying on a table, and threw it at them.

The twins were able to dodge it, but Junior was too slow, getting hit in the face with it, blinding him for a second, and when he did regain his vision, he found a blade sticking through his stomach.

Melanie and Milita looked on in horror as Junior fell to the ground, coughing up blood.

"JUNIOR!"

Neo snarled at them, causing them both to back away in fear. She stabbed him again, and this time he didn't make a noise.

Neo wiped the blood off her hands, and turned to face the twins, but they were both gone. The henchmen had fled too.

Looking down at herself, Neo took in what she had just done. Killed a man simply because he didn't know something.

But she didn't care. Now Roman was gone, there was no one left to hold her back. Roman would've stopped her from doing that, he didn't kill people for stupid reasons like that. Now she could let all the pain, all the suffering she had endured, onto other people.

Despite what she had just done, she couldn't have felt any better in that moment.

It was so good, she wanted to laugh.

So she did. Sat herself down the ground and laughed loudly, the first time she had in so many years. It grew in pitch and volume, until she had practically turned into a psychopath. But then she immediately broke down into tears, because she still had nowhere to go, no one to turn to. Junior was her only hope of finding Cinder and Ruby, and now he was dead.

Curling her knees up to her chest, she continued to sob.

_**Do what we do best**_

Melanie and Milita were running as far away from the club as they could. They were in a state of shock after what had just happened. Seeing Junior dying in front of them like that, after what had just happened…

The two of them turned into a alleyway, and Melanie sank down to the ground, and burrowed her face in her hands. Milita looked around the corner, like she was almost expecting Neo to be standing there, parasol in hand, with a sadistic smile on her face.

"Why did she do that?" Melanie sobbed. "Why?" She took her face out of her hands, and there were tears on her face. "Why?"

"I don't know." Milita could already feel herself breaking down, but she had to stay strong for her twin.

"He didn't know, and then she just…" Melanie broke down into full on crying. Milita knelt down next to her, and pulled her twin into a strong hug.

"What are we going to do now?"

Milita began to cry too, sobbing into her twins shoulder.

"I don't know Melanie, I don't know."

_**Do what we do best **_

"Is he not even going to bother to say goodbye?" Roman asked when Trifa walked out. She was now carrying two daggers, with a revolver form built into the both of them. They did have a custom design of a spider engraved on the both of them. Jace had looked like he had wanted to tear her head off when she asked if he could add them, but he obliged.

"Doesn't seem like it."

Roman shrugged and opened the car door.

"Wait, aren't you going to pay him?"

"If he's not going to have basic manners, then he doesn't deserved to be paid."

They got into the car and drove off. Jace watched them go, before a realisation struck him.

"I didn't get paid did I?"

_**Do what we do best **_

"So, what now?" Trifa asked, as they drove through Vale.

"We need to get out of this city. Mistral would be the best place to go. Vacuo's conditions are far too extreme, and Atlas… well, you know."

She did know. Yuma had told her that his mum, dad and sister had all been involved in the Faunus labour. His sister had died when a section of the cave had come tumbling down.

And then there was Ilia…

Oh gods, Ilia. She hadn't even thought about her since she left. She silently prayed she was okay.

"-sneaking on a boat might be possible, but we would have to- Stop daydreaming and listen!"

"Sorry! I got lost in my thoughts again."

"You really need to stop doing that."

"That's only-"

"Anyway, we could sneak onto a boat, but I would need to disguise myself somehow. Your not a public figure, so you'd be fine."

"How are you going to disguise yourself?"

"I'll probably have to take off my hat, get some hair dye, and remove my eyeliner. That should do. I hope."

"I thought criminal masterminds like yourself never left anything to chance."

"Archane, it looks like I won't have a choice. If you wouldn't mind, go and look up some boat trips. We'll need to be leaving as soon as possible."

He handed his scroll to her.

She began to look up trips. "Okay, there's one leaving tomorrow at three o'clock. Do you think-"

The car stopped suddenly. Roman was looking out a window at a shop.

It was titled _Jake's barbers. _It looked abandoned.

"A barbers would have hair dye, right?"

"I guess."

Roman parked the car on a kerb, and got out.

"Let's find out."

_**Do what we do best **_

**Rest in peace Junior. Taken out by a blonde girl, killed by a ice cream girl. **

**Thanks for reading and have a good day! **


	6. Croc and Chameleon

**Chapter 6: Croc and Chameleon **

**What's Roman going to do to himself for a disguise? Who knows? Well, I do, and your about to find out. **

_**Criminals and Mentors**_

"_You are a disgrace to our kind!" Adam kicked Yuma over onto his back, the Lieutenant watching with no remorse at all. "Trying to run away? Saying we've taken it too far? What a fool." _

_Trifa and Ilia watched on in horror as Adam drew Wilt out of it's sheath. He walked over, like a predator about to make a kill. _

"_Please don't do this…" Yuma's begging for mercy was ignored. _

"_He's actually going to do it…" Ilia whispered. _

"_Allow this to be a message for anyone who is thinking of leaving the White Fang." Adam's voice was cold, no regret whatsoever. He held Wilt up high…_

_Trifa couldn't watch, turning herself away as she heard Yuma cry out in pain, his breath coming out in short gasps, before stopping completely. _

_Trifa felt a small pair of arms wrap around her, as Ilia did her best to comfort her. She turned around and saw Yuma's body, unmoving, his face as pale as a vampire…_

"Are you going to come in, or are you going to just stand there?" Roman poked his head out of the barbers.

"Oh right, sorry." She entered. It looked like any old barbers, there were chairs, scissors, razors and the like lying around. The only things absent were the actual barbers, despite it being a Monday. Roman got straight to looking for hair dye, and Trifa just stood around.

Yuma dying had truly been a eye opener for Trifa, not only about Adam, but also about herself. This was a example of a man who had gone too far, who had sacrificed everything just to get revenge. This was who she could potentially become if she continued on with the White Fang. And in that moment, she realised she didn't want to be like that, didn't want to be a cold hearted individual. She wanted to strive for Faunus equality, but in a different way…

"Aha! Found some!"

Roman came out with a bottle of… blonde hair dye?

_This is going to be a disaster. _

It was, but it would be necessary, for Roman to go unnoticed.

"You are going to look so stupid."

"That's the idea. No one will pay attention. The boats going to be leaving soon, so I'm not going to have time for clothes. I found this bag here. I can put my hat into it."

He headed into the bathroom and began to apply it.

Roman found himself wondering what they would do when they were in Mistral. He had initially planned to just rise up as a crime lord, but he would have to make sure that Trifa was on board with that first.

_She could be like Neo. My partner in crime. _

No, that was a foolish thought. No one could replace Neo, no matter how sassy, funny, or skilled they were. Neo had had more personality in her pinky finger than most criminals did in their entire bodies. She was irreplaceable.

When he was finished, he took off his hat and gently placed it in the bag. No one touched the hat, if they did, they would find themselves staring down the barrel of Melodic Cugel, right before he blew their head off.

He slung the bag over his shoulder, and walked back out. Trifa raised a eyebrow.

"You don't actually look as stupid as I thought you would."

"Well, that's great. Come on, we need to catch us a boat."

_**Do what we do best**_

Ilia was fuming. Trifa had left. She was gone, leaving Ilia all on her own again.

_Why? Why did you leave me like Blake did? _

Her feelings were all mixed up. One part of her heart was telling her to hate, the other was telling her to love. Having feelings for both Blake and Trifa was the worst thing ever. She couldn't decide who she cared about more, nor could she admit to either of them how she felt.

She would never have the chance too now, because they were both gone. Probably forever. And Adam had sworn to kill both of them…

After seeing what happened to Yuma, she was too scared to run, out of fear the same thing would happen to her. Why had Adam done that? Why had he all of sudden turned away from what he once stood for?

And now she was hearing rumours that he was planning to overthrow Sienna…

If that happened , she didn't know what she would do.

_I should warn Sienna. _

But who wasn't to say her guards weren't in league with Adam? They were just rumours, they might not be true…

With the way Adam had been acting lately though, she could see it being true.

Ilia put her face in her hands.

_I don't know what to do… _

"You alright there love?"

Panicking, llia's faunus trait activated, and she found herself blending in with the environment.

Tock rolled her eyes. "Come on now, I'm not that scary, I'm I? I know about your little trick, just come out. Your not fooling me."

Ilia was terrified of Tock. The way she moved, the way she talked….

And those teeth. She had seen her fair share of crocodile Faunus, but none of them scared her quite like Tock did.

She came back out, and faced Tock.

"Your shaking. Are you cold or something?"

"N-no, Miss Tock."

"Miss Tock? Why would you call me that?"

"I-I-"

"What is up with you? Have you seen a ghost or something?"

Whether Tock generally didn't know, or whether she was just playing with llia, wasn't quite clear.

Ilia eyed up her stopwatch, which if what she had heard was correct, Tock would apparently set it to a minute and then her enemy would die in that minute. Just another reason on the list to be scared of her.

"Cat got your tongue?"

"No."

"Ah, there you are! Was thinking I lost you."

"Well, I don't…"

She hadn't a clue what to say.

"Look, I'm just trying to start small talk here, dear. I would like to get to know the people I'll be working with."

"Well, um, there's not a whole lot to say about me. I'm called Iila, I'm a chameleon Faunus, I, um, I'm gay, and…"

_No, no, no, no! Why would you tell her that? _

"Well, as Adam announced, I'm Tock." Seeing Ilia's startled expression, she laughed. "What, did you think I was going to judge you because your gay? I may be sadistic, but I'm not judgemental love."

Ilia chuckled a bit, and then quickly tried to cover it up. Tock grinned. "See? I'm not so bad, I'm I?"

"I just, um…"

"Look, I can tell your absolutely terrified of me. And, well, I can understand that. I'm not exactly very pleasant to look at, I'm I? But trust me Ilia, I'm not as scary as I seem. I actually consider myself to be quite a lovely person, well, minus all the murder and bounty hunting and stuff."

Tock held out her hand. "Let's shake on it, shall we?"

"Shake on what?"

"My promise that I'm not scary." She smiled, once again revealing those razor sharp teeth of hers.

Ilia thought about it for a moment, and then grasped Tock's hand. Her skin felt awfully, well, scaly.

They shook on it.

"You know, Ilia," Her yellow eyes stared into Ilia's own grey ones, like the sun and the moon, "I think I'm going to like you."

_**Do what we do best **_

"Okay, we're here now, we don't have a ticket, what's the plan?" Trifa asked.

"I'm just going to pay for a ticket. I have lien, no need to pull any stealthy moves."

The boat was due to depart in about half a hour. Roman drove up past the ticket booth.

"Hey, can I just pay for one now?"

"Sure you can." Trifa held her breath as the man looked Roman up and down. Luckily, he didn't seem to recognise him.

"What's your name?"

_Uh oh. _

That was a problem.

"My name is, uhhh, Perry?"

That would do.

"Second name?"

_Oh, for the love of… _

"Uh, Derry?"

The man filled in a ticket, and handed it to Roman, or Perry as he was now called.

"What about your women there?"

"Trifa Ecluse."

The man handed her a ticket. "There you are."

"Thank you." Roman said, and he drove their stolen ride onto the boat.

A loud voice boomed over the loudspeaker. _We will be departing in five minutes. Please leave your vehicle and head onto the deck. _

Getting out of the car, both Roman and Trifa headed upstairs to where the restaurant, gift shop and a movie room was located. "So Archane, have you every been to Mistral before?"

"Nope. I've only been in Menagerie and Vale. I lived in Menagerie for most of my life."

"Ah, I see." Roman took out a cigar and smoked thoughtfully. "You'll like Mistral. It doesn't have it's own crime lord, that's where we come in. We'll be causing a bit of chaos to say the least."

"Do we have to cause chaos?" Trifa asked. After a few years of killing humans and working for the White Fang, the idea of living a cosy, relaxing life was very appealing.

_But then there's Adam… _

He had sworn to come after her. She could only hope that he wouldn't find her.

Roman gave her a perplexed look. "You really think I want to keep this hair dye on, and go into hiding? That's boring! Not to mention, if we were to go into hiding, we would need a job. Working in a fast food place isn't very exciting. Crime isn't just about money anyway. It's all about the thrill, and surviving this harsh world we live in."

"I think the hair dye suits you."

"Really? You must have pretty low standards then."

_Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking…_

Roman suddenly seemed very interested in the small shelf of newspapers that were on offer for people to read during the trip. He pulled out one called _Remnant Today,_ and took a seat. Trifa sat down next to him, with her own copy. The front page had caught her eye, saying _White Fang behind the Fall of Beacon? _

That wasn't true, Trifa knew that. They had been a part of it, but they weren't the masterminds. That belonged to…

_What was her name again? _

Cinder, was it? She had never met her, nor did she have any wish to. Apparently, Adam hadn't been too keen to work with her, which wasn't surprising.

The article went on about how the White Fang had let the Grimm into the city, and how they had attacked people.

A nearby TV flicked onto life.

_This is Lisa Lavender reporting from… _

Roman raised a eyebrow. "So they left newspaper for people to read, but they also have the news playing? And it's about the Fall of Beacon? Shock, horror."

Romans' sarcasm aside, the Fall of Beacon was the number one topic everywhere. And that wasn't shocking. The school had stood for decades, and several legendary huntsmen and huntresses had passed through it's doors.

So to see it just crumble was quite a event…

"And then my car got stolen by Roman Torchwick and some weird girl!"

Both Roman and Trifa went on high alert. The guy who Roman had knocked unconscious was sitting not too far away, chatting to his mate.

"Dude, it couldn't have been Torchwick. He died at Beacon."

_It has also been reported that master criminal Roman Torchwick died at Beacon… _

"See?"

"No way, I knew who I saw. He was wearing that hat, he had the same orange hair-"

"Are you sure you weren't drunk?"

"No! He then shot me and knocked me out!"

Roman and Trifa shared a look behind their newspapers.

This was going to be a interesting boat ride.

_**Do what we do best **_

**Dun dun! He's back! Who could forget him, he's a classic character! **

**Thank you for reading and have a good day! **


	7. An interesting development

**Chapter 7: An interesting development **

This was bad, very bad.

"Why is he here?" Trifa whispered underneath her breath.

Roman put a finger to his lips. "Just ignore him and he might go away."

"I can't believe I let them do that!" The guy literally sat down right next to Roman. Trifa shuffled up her seat a bit and Roman soon followed her. He gave the two of them a strange look, and Trifa made sure to basically bury her face in the newspaper. "I mean, I had a weapon and I got knocked out with ease!"

"Bro, calm down."

"My bloody car was stolen and your telling me to calm down?!"

"There's nothing you can do about it now, okay? You can just, buy a new one."

The man sighed.

"Do you remember what your girl looked like?"

"I didn't get a good look at her, but she had, like, blue hair? I also think she had some weird veins in her skin."

"Probably a spider Faunus."

Trifa's blood ran cold. If she even lifted her head, they might notice her. And while the guy had said he hadn't got a good look at her, no chances would be taken.

Thanks to Romans' disguise, he could afford to take more risks. She couldn't.

"Hey missy."

_Don't talk to me, don't talk to me… _

"Don't you think you might suffocate yourself doing that?"

It was definitely him. He was talking to her.

Luckily, Perry Derry came to the rescue.

"She's obviously very interested in it! Isn't that right, um, Emily?"

"Yes, that's right." Her voice was extremely muffled.

"What could be so interesting that you literally disappear into the newspaper?"

"Uhh…" Roman looked at her copy. "Why, the fall of Beacon of course!"

"Right…Anyways, there are no papers left. Mind if we borrow yours?"

"We?" Roman asked.

"Yes, me and my mate here. We both need one."

This was extremely bad.

"Uh, sure!" Roman was one step away from knocking them both out. He handed his over. He looked at Trifa.

"Mind if I just…" The guy walked over to her. She very slowly, making sure to hang her head as low as possible, handed it over, but then, god forbid something actually went well for them, he dropped it, and when he bent down to pick it up, he got a good look at her.

_Please don't recognise me. _

"Have we… met somewhere before?"

_For the love of everything that is holy! _

"No, I don't think so."

"It's just, you have blue hair and you look like a spider Faunus…"

"Must be a coincidence!" She gave out a nervous laugh. He turned to Roman.

"And now that I think about it, you look a lot like Roman Torchwick if he had blonde hair…" His voice rose in volume. "Almost as if you were wearing a disguise!"

"Look, I'm sure this is all just a big misunderstanding-"

He growled and suddenly grabbed Romans' cane. "Hey, that's mine! Give it back!" Roman swiped it back. But one look at the cane was all that man needed.

"Hey, where are you- Oof!" Roman sprang out of his seat and took off like a bullet.

"Don't let them get away-Ow!" Trifa practically stepped all over his face and was right behind him.

"Someone, stop them!" In the midst of chaos, several people were knocked out and bodies were sent flying.

"Archane, to the lifeboats!" It was their only chance of getting away at this point. Jumping onto the ceiling, she began to climb over peoples heads, webbing a few of them up in the confusion.

Roman pushed the door open and sprinted to the deck, and began to launch the lifeboat. Once he it was set up, he was about to climb in, when…

"Roman!" Trifa had been grabbed by a big burly guy, and was desperately struggling to get free. Severe other people were closing in from the sides, including a man with a gun.

"Don't move!"

She suddenly froze. Roman looked at the boat, and looked back to her.

_I could leave… _He thought to himself. No one seemed to be paying any kind of attention to him. It would just be a simple case of jumping in and launching it. Boom, he was gone.

Trifa's eyes met his, and it was clear she was begging him to help. For a split second, a young girl forced down by men bigger then her, she almost looked like Neo.

_I can't leave her behind… _

He just couldn't. If he did, he would be out there, all on his own again. It would drive him insane, no human…

_And Faunus. _

No human or Faunus interaction whatsoever.

_What I'm I doing? _

The Roman Torchwick of old would have said "Screw it" and left. But not anymore. Sighing to himself, he ran back to her. The people didn't notice until he was on them like a whirlwind, striking them down. He even threw one unfortunate guy into the water. The brute, who still had one arm wrapped around Trifa, made to grab him too, but he ducked and hit him hard in the face. It only dazed him for a second, and he brought his foot up in a kick, only for Roman to sidestep it and aim his cane at the mans legs. He could hear bones snapping as he fired, and the poor man went down like a tonne of bricks, nearly crushing Trifa under his body weight, but she was able to slip away.

"Freeze criminals! Don't move!" The boats security had shown up, blocking their way to the lifeboat.

"Hands in the air and get down on your knees!"

Roman got down on his knees and quickly motioned for her to do the same. The security guards walked over to them, and just as they were about to take their weapons away, Roman shot one of them in the face, and aiming at the lifeboat, he shot at the rope tethering it to the deck. The lifeboat fell in with a loud splash.

"Open fire!"

"Jump for the lifeboat!"

The two of them raced for the railings, near where the lifeboat had been deployed.

"Grab them!" The security guards were too slow for them, as Roman and Trifa both jumped over them, landing in the boat.

Roman began fiddling with the motor, and just as a guy jumped over after them, the boat shot off like a rocket, and he landed in the water.

Roman waved at them. "Ta ta everyone!"

There were several shouts and curses thrown at them, and soon the ship disappeared out of sight.

_**Do what we do best **_

"Are we sure that he is fit to lead the White Fang?" Fennec asked. "He has been growing increasingly… unstable as of late."

Tock didn't even need to ask who they were talking about. Adam. She looked at Ilia, who was taking in every word they said.

_This is so boring, innit?_

Tock was only here for the money. She didn't care whether Adam was fit for the role or not, so long as she got her pay check, all would be fine.

She didn't even particularly care about Faunus equality, accepting that it would probably never happen. Not that mattered to her, she had her fair share of human friends.

She stared at Fennec and Corsac, who were monologuing, as usual. They were going on about how Adams goal had seemed to shifted from gaining equality for the Faunus, to gaining revenge on the few people who had left the White Fang to seek their own ends.

_I don't see the point in it. Why put all your resources into going after a few people? _

The overthrowing of Sienna Khan was set to happen soon, and Tock couldn't wait. It meant that she could stop lurking around and actually do something productive.

His supporters had gathered from different parts of Vale, Menagerie, even some from Atlas had managed to escape and join them.

"Well, we shall see how things unfold." Corsac was saying. "Thank you for attending, Sister Ilia and Sister Tock."

_Sister Tock? Are you bloody joking? _

How stupid. Fennec and Corsac bowed and they left the room.

"Maybe he isn't fit to lead us…" Ilia whispered.

"What was that?"

"Nothing. I'm just wondering whether Adam is fit to lead us." She seemed a bit more comfortable around Tock now after that last conversation.

"Well, for what it's worth, lots of people seem to think he is."

Suddenly, the man himself walked in.

"Tock." He thrust his thumb to the door. "It's time." He left without another word.

"Time for what?"

Tock cracked her knuckles. "Time for our overthrowing of course." She smiled at her and slapped her on the arm. "Later kid."

She followed after Adam.

Ilia, after a moments thought, got up and went after her.

_**Do what we do best**_

"Ah yes, don't you just love the feeling of being out in the middle of nowhere, all alone, the only thing between you and sudden death-"

"I get it Roman. And your death wouldn't be sudden, you'd have to drown first."

Roman pointed his finger at her. "Don't be smart. Only I'm allowed to do that."

Trifa draped her arm over the edge of the boat, and moved her hand through the water, looking at her reflection. Her abdomen was still aching from where the man had grabbed her and almost squeezed her to death.

She would still be there if it hadn't been for Roman.

She looked at him. Speaking of which…

"You came back for me." She whispered, almost hoping he didn't hear.

No such luck.

"Huh, I guess I did." He fiddled around in his coat pocket, and groaned upon the realisation he had no cigars left.

She looked at him. He had his hat back on, and was staring at the broken moon in the sky.

She wanted to say thank you, but for some reason the words wouldn't come.

So they just sat there, staring into the distance.

"How do you think that happened?" He said suddenly.

She gave him a confused look. "How did what happen?"

"That." He pointed to the shattered moon. "How do you think the moon got shattered?"

She looked up at it, a brilliant beacon of white light.

"I'm…. not sure. Never really thought about it."

"Me and Neo used to talk about it sometimes…" He trailed off.

"Neo? Is that your small girl with the ice cream coloured hair?"

"Yep. That's her. Or, that was her."

_That was her? _

"Did she-"

"I don't want to talk about it."

Trifa stared at him. There was something glistening on his face.

_Tears? _

If those were tears, Trifa could have a pretty good guess of what had happened to Neo.

_Should I… comfort him? _

She didn't know how he would react.

"I'm sorry." There was nothing else to be said.

He didn't say anything.

That's when she finally said it.

"Thank you."

"What?"

"Thank you."

"For what?"

"For coming back to me on the boat… You could have just left, but you didn't. You came back."

He shrugged. "Your welcome."

"I didn't think you would. I guess all the things I heard about you in the White Fang were wrong."

He looked back at her, and their eyes met for what felt like a eternity.

_This is awkward. _

Were they supposed to hug now or something?

He may not appreciate it, but after seeing those tears on his face, after coming back for her, after not treating her the way she thought he would, screw it, he deserved one.

She suddenly came forward, drawing him into a embrace. He didn't react, didn't even say anything.

For a moment, she thought he would push her away, try and throw her off. But he didn't. In fact, looking at his face, he seemed more surprised than anything else.

And a moment later, she felt him return the hug.

Looking at the moon, she then began to wonder how it had happened. Was it simply always like that? Or had a otherworldly force smashed it? They would probably never know.

"Now, I know we're underneath the moonlight, but if you dare try and kiss me, your dead."

She laughed, and slowly drew away from him. She couldn't see him clearly, but she knew he had appreciated that, even if he wouldn't say.

"Now, Archane, time to get some shut eye. You can go first and I'll keep watch."

She nodded and laid down, allowing her legs to drape over the side of the boat. She knew that her back would be screaming in agony when she woke up, but she didn't care. She hadn't even realised how tired she was.

Her last sight before falling asleep was of him, standing up, cane in hand, surveying the sea before sleep took her.

_**Do what we do best**_

**Damn it! Why did you have to die Roman?! Why did you have to die on me like that?! **

**Also, I wonder what a Roman and Trifa ship name would be? Now, don't get excited, because I don't plan on them becoming lovers, but it's still fun to think about it. **

**The Orange Spider? **

**Archanwick? **

**Those two are pretty bad. **

**So anyway, join me next time for a new episode of "Neo kills everyone!" **

**Thanks for reading and have a good day!**


	8. Taking the Throne

**Chapter 8: Taking the Throne**

_**Do what we do best**_

She still hadn't found either one of them. Ruby or Cinder. They had both evaded her, somehow, some way. But she wouldn't stop looking, no, she would never stop looking. Not until they both got what they deserved. Death would be sweet.

In a way, she almost hoped that Ruby or Cinder would take her with them, because then she could be reunited with Roman in heaven.

Or hell. The two of them had done some pretty nasty things in their life.

She walked down the road, parasol held up due to the fact it was raining. A perfect example of her mood at this moment in time.

She didn't feel any remorse for killing Junior, nor did she care that the Malachite Twins had got away. She just couldn't give two damns. Roman had went to him for men once, but that was about where the interaction ended.

Probably for the best too.

Neo passed a puddle and looked at her reflection. She didn't pay any attention to the state of her clothes, but she was shivering, really badly. The cold bit into her skin like a wolf, and she didn't even realise how tired she was. Suddenly, a man with orange hair walked past, and for one moment, she thought he was back, risen from the dead like a ghost. But he wasn't.

How long had she been walking? A day? Weeks? Months? She couldn't tell, but her aching legs told her it was either the second or third one.

She took another step forward. Then another, hoping the bitter cold might numb her legs. But it was no use, and soon enough, she realised she couldn't go on like this. Even if she did find Cinder or Ruby, she wouldn't be in a state to take them on. Even that blonde girl she had fought on the train could have knocked her out at this moment, and honestly, she'd embrace that. Embrace the feeling of pain, of misery, of death.

She ducked into a nearby shop, hoping for some comfort, anything.

Panting, she walked over to a nearby seat and just sank into a seat, putting her parasol next to her.

She lay back and began to close her eyes, until something nearby caught her attention. She hadn't payed any attention when she walked in, but this was a clothes store. And nearby was a hat selection.

Sitting neatly on the shelf, was a bowler hat with a red band round the middle, and a feather slotted into the back.

Standing up, she walked over to it, until she noticed that someone else had already picked it up and was trying it on…

_That's mine. _

That was his hat, so now she had a right to it.

"Hey, check it out!"

"Dude, you kind of look like Roman Torchwick!"

"Do I?"

"Yeah!"

"Does anybody have a cane lying about?"

"Here!" One of the girls snuck over and stole one off a old man, who collapsed helplessly to the ground.

Shaking her head, she advanced onto the gang. He was now holding the cane, doing his best Roman impression.

"Ooo, look at me, I'm Roman Torchwick! I can beat up people with my-"

She snatched the hat off the top of his head. He turned to her.

"What do you think your doing little girl?"

Waving her hand at him, she ran off with the hat.

"Hey, come back here-"

The youths met justice. In which, the old mans wife purse gave them a good ole smack to the face.

Now away, Neo stared at the hat.

And immediately broke down crying.

She cradled it to her chest, continuously sobbing. No one even paid her any attention.

Sobbing, Neo then did the one thing she didn't think she'd ever be able to do again, not after what happened when she was younger.

She spoke. She spoke the name of the one man who had given it all to her, who had raised her, who had been there for her at every corner. Even though her throat burned with a agonising pain, she did it anyway.

"Roman…"

_**Do what we do best **_

"High leader, may I speak with you for a moment?"

"Adam, I have far more important matters to attend to."

"Please, I beg of you. It is important."

The guards stood by her side. They all had their eyes on Adam, awaiting his command.

It was time they got what they deserved. A new leader who would rise up and wipe out the humans.

Sienna took a seat on her throne, soon to be his.

"You'd best have something important to tell me."

"Thank you Sienna. I am extremely grateful."

He rose to his feet from his kneeling down position.

"Sienna, what was your goal when you became High Leader?"

"I'm sorry?" She seemed rather taken aback by the question.

"Your goal, what did you hope to achieve?"

"I want to achieve the same thing you do! Equality for the Faunus!"

Adam didn't say anything for a moment.

"Is that what you wanted to ask me? Don't make me laugh."

"Tell me, what do you think happens when a leader is no longer fit to rule their people? When people began to doubt them, lose faith in them?"

"They would stand down."

"But what happens when that person is too full of themselves, thinking that they are still worthy of being a leader?"

Sienna was beginning to grow extremely suspicious. "What are you saying?"

"I am saying that no matter how good a leader thinks there are, no matter how well they've lead their people, there is always someone better."

Sienna curled her hand into a fist. "Are you saying-"

"Yes Sienna. That is exactly what I am saying. I won't beat around the bush. The time has come for you to step down, and for me to take over."

Sienna slammed her hand on the edge of the throne. "You really have the nerve to walk in here, and say to me that I'm not worthy of leading our people?"

"That's not-"

"Silence! Do you really think that you have the power to make those decisions?! That you would be worthy of taking such a position?!"

"Well Sienna, whether you like it or not, you are stepping down today."

"And now you threaten me?! You have gone insane with revenge. With power. I will not allow you to-"

Suddenly, her guards on either side of her turned and pointed their weapons at her.

Several men came bursting through the door, and striding out behind them was Tock with a wicked grin on her face.

"What is the meaning of this?"

"Sienna, you are the one who has went insane, thinking that you can still lead us. I appreciate your services, but it is time for you to go."

"From this day forward, I will be the one to lead the White Fang."

She stood up off her throne, and looked around her. "You're wrong."

"Do you really think that you can take us all on? I don't want to kill you, but I will if necessary."

Sienna went for her chain whip, but stopped upon the realisation that he was right. There were simply too many. She'd be dead before getting anywhere near him.

"Fine." Adam smiled.

She stepped off her throne, and walked past him, glaring at him. The White Fang kept their weapons pointed at her.

"Now, that wasn't too hard, was it?" Tock asked as she walked past her. She had no idea who this crocodile Faunus was, but she didn't particularly care.

"Thank you Sienna." Adam walked up to the throne, and took a good long look at it before sitting down. "I promise, this is a decision you won't regret."

Sienna was already on her way out. For a second, she thought she saw Ilia, blending in with the surroundings, but quickly lost sight of her.

She pushed open the door, and took one last look at Adam, the man who had sacrificed everything to get where he was now.

Including her trust.

_**Do what we do best**_

Roman slowly opened his eyes. Trifa was shaking him.

_Did I… fall asleep? _

Of course he had.

"Hey, I think we're almost there."

Roman looked, and saw she was indeed right. There was a patch of land beginning to form in the distance.

"Do you reckon that's Mistral?"

"I would certainly hope so." Roman sat up, rubbing his eyes. Grabbing Melodic Cugel, he stood up and began wishing he hadn't fell asleep. He didn't know when Trifa had woken up, but what he did know was that anything could have happened in the time he was asleep.

His mind was drawn back to the conversation of last night.

He had never planned on telling her about Neo. It had just sort of came out of his mouth, before he could stop and think about what he was saying.

And then she had hugged him. He had never been touched by a Faunus before, so he assumed it would feel weird. But it hadn't. It had felt… normal. Nice, actually, in a way. But he was far too prideful to admit that.

"How long until we get there you reckon?" Looking at her, her hair whipping around her face, he realised they were actually closing in very fast, thanks to him booting up the motor again just a second ago.

"Dunno. About ten minutes?"

Trifa sat back down, and sighed to herself softly.

"What do you think will happen to the White Fang now?" He asked. She blinked, not sure she had heard his question properly.

"I… don't know. Me leaving is hardly going to change anything, it'll probably remain the same."

"You do know that they will probably be the ones the people blame for the Fall of Beacon?"

"What? But it was all, um, what was her name again?"

"Cinder?"

"Yeah, Cinder! It was all her fault!"

"You need to remember, Cinder isn't a public figure. The White Fang were the ones to let Grimm in. So they're not entirely blameless. Especially when it comes to Adam."

Adam… Trifa wondered what he was doing now. Probably planning another attack or something.

"No way…"

She looked at Roman. His eyes were wide."What's wrong?"

He groaned. "I was hoping this wouldn't happen."

"What wouldn't happen?"

He pointed to the open water ahead of them, and she saw what he was talking about. There were rows and rows of boats, as well as…

_Watchtowers. _

Her breath caught in her throat. "That's…"

Roman nodded grimly. "Border patrol."

_**Do what we do best **_

**Oh boy. It's getting good now. With Adam as the leader of the White Fang, and Roman and Trifa almost at Mistral, the main plot can finally begin to unfold. **

**Quick heads up. That is going to be the last Neo scene for a while. Don't worry, she's not disappearing completely, I just want to really focus, on Trifa, Roman, and the White Fang for the next while. **

**In fact, when I was planning this chapter, I originally thought to have that last scene be the first one, have the White Fang scene, then have them sneaking through border patrol, but then I realised there hadn't been a Neo scene for a while, so I wrote one. Just know that she's still tracking Cinder and Ruby. Whether she'll find them or not is a different story. **

**Thanks for reading and have a good day!**


	9. Stealth goes out the window

**Chapter 9: Stealth goes out the window**

_**Do what we do best**_

"What are we going do?" Trifa asked Roman.

Biting his lip, Roman scoured the deep vast knowledge of his criminal mind to try and come up with a plan. Unfortunately, nothing came to him.

"I honestly don't know." The boat was drifting slowly closer to the border patrol.

Then, the sound of a engine could be heard. Looking up, they both noticed a helicopter flying above them.

"Please don't see us." Roman said. A big light was shone on them. "Uh oh."

"This is the Mistral Border patrol! Identify yourselves immediately!"

"Um, hi there! I'm Perry Derry! And this is my, um, friend Trifa Ecluse."

The helicopter suddenly got awfully close to them. A faint beeping sound could be heard.

Roman cursed under his breath. Trifa looked at him. "What?"

"That's the-"

"Our facial recognition system has told us that you are Roman Torchwick, a convicted criminal of Vale!"

"Only Vale? I've been all over the, I mean, no I'm not! There must be some kind of mistake! Maybe the technology's faulty?"

"Technology from Atlas is not faulty!"

"It's from Atlas? We're in real trouble then." He muttered to Trifa. "Um, I'm his twin brother?"

"A quick criminal database scan has informed us that Roman Torchwick does not have a twin brother!"

_They're good. _

"I still think the technology is faulty!"

"Technology from Atlas is not faulty!"

"You've already said that!"

"We shall now be taking you both in for extensive questioning!"

The helicopter then shot two grappling hooks out, grabbing both of them and then they were both thrown into the helicopter, along with the bag that Roman had put his hat into. The helicopter began to fly towards the main station.

"Wait…" Roman looked at the spot where the pilot was supposed to be. "Look!"

It was controlled by a autopilot system, and the voices they had just heard were prerecorded.

"You have got to be messing with me!" He strode right over, and was just about to destroy it until Trifa stopped him.

"Don't you think we should, I dunno, wait until we get to the main station and then destroy it?"

"Hmm, that's probably a better idea." He strode right back over, and began to wonder why they hadn't put up some lasers or something to protect the one thing that would bring the entire helicopter down if smashed.

Just as they were above the main station, Roman then smashed it.

The helicopter literally dropped out of the air, hitting the main station and causing it to explode, but Roman and Trifa were both long gone by then as Trifa grabbed hold of a Roman and swung herself and him over to a nearby tree. Roman still had that bag somehow.

They both took off running as far away from the burning building as they could, towards a forest in the distance.

_**Do What we do best**_

"So" Adam said, rising up to his feet. "I think it's time we make a few changes around here." He grinned.

Tock, Ilia and The Lieutenant were all gathered in front of him. Ilia and The Lieutenant were kneeling. Tock was playing around with her weapons.

"Firstly, there will be no more holding back. We will not hesitate to strike down any and all humans that stand in our way. Sienna did not think we could win a war against the humans. She was wrong."

"Secondly, we aren't going to let the two traitors get away. Trifa Ecluse and Blake Belladonna will be found, alive, and brought to me. I won't allow them the reassurance that they've escaped."

He turned to Tock. "I will task you with hunting them down." She grinned manically.

"Lieutenant, I will be tasking you with leading the assault on the SDC."

"Yes High Leader."

He sat back down. "If you have any opposition to these plans, speak now."

"Adam," Ilia's voice cut through. "Don't you think we'll be spreading ourselves a bit thin here? I mean, with going after the SDC, do you really think we can take on the Atlas Military, which is steadily getting stronger?"

"Do not worry Ilia. Our numbers are growing every day. We are skilled enough to fight them." His voice held a note of certainty in it, but Ilia was still unsure. Tock patted her on the head.

"Any more questions?" No one spoke up. "Good. Let's get started then."

All three of them left the room, leaving Adam alone on his throne.

_By the end of our revolution, the humans will be quivering in fear, begging for mercy which won't come as we kill them. Perhaps I shall leave a few alive, just to act for entertainment. They will realise we are the superior species. They will serve us, we will control them just like they have controlled us for so long. _

The thought made him smile.

The Lieutenant walked away without a word. Ilia caught a final glimpse of Adam before the doors shut.

"So, guess I'm going after the Belladonna girl and your other girl." Tock said. "Oh, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't looking forward to this." She turned to walk away, until Ilia put a hand on her shoulder.

"What's up with you?"

"Is it… Can I come?"

A brief look of uncertainty flashed across Tock's face, before she smiled. "Course you can love. Two is better than one."

Ilia wasn't really listening though, she was already thinking about what she was going to say to Blake or Trifa.

_They both left me. Left me here, alone, with Adam…_

A fury lit inside of her. She was going to make them pay.

_**Do what we do best**_

As soon as they were away from the burning building, Trifa and Roman were now in the middle of a dark and damp forest.

"I didn't think Mistral had that many forests." Trifa commented as she cut through a section of vines.

"Well, apparently it does." Roman smacked a Grimm monkey that had gotten a bit too close for his liking. "Why all the vines though?"

"It is a forest."

They continued hacking their way through, knocking away mosquitoes and other insects. Just as they were reaching a clearing, a loud roar through the forest caught their attention.

"Uh oh." Roman helpfully commented.

When they reached the clearing, the foe showed itself. It was a Beringel Grimm.

"Oh dearie me, that's a big Grimm."

"Not helpful Roman!"

The Beringel beat its chest and roared, before making a jump at them.

They both jumped out of the way as the Grimm smashed into the ground where they had just been standing. Eyeing them both up, it ran for Roman, who took several shots at it, but it kept on coming, trying to grab him before he rolled to the side, and Trifa ran up to it and slashed it in the leg, and it tried to pummel her, but she narrowly dodged it, before leaping onto its head, and proceeding to hack away at its eyes.

It roared, and Roman took that opportunity to smack it in the chest, but that only seemed to anger it more, as it grabbed Trifa and threw her halfway across the forest, but she slowed her fall down with a web, and landed nimbly in a tree. Switching her knives to revolver mode, she took several pot shots at it, trying to grab it's attention. She succeeded, and soon it came leaping at her, and she leaped off the tree, over to the next one. It followed suite, and soon they were caught up in a desperate chase, with Roman trying to keep up. He blasted the tree that Trifa had just came off of, hoping that when the Beringel tried to follow, it would fall over, but no such luck, as it changed direction midair, grabbing another tree and swinging off it.

Sighing loudly, he questioned his life decisions before running after them.

Soon, the Beringel caught up to Trifa, and she swung underneath another tree, as it tried to crush her. Swinging back up, she kicked it in the face, temporarily stunning it, before trying to web it up, but it dodged, grabbing the web as it passed, pulling it backwards, causing her to slingshot towards it.

Grabbing her, the Grimm punched her as hard as she could sending her flying back into a tree. It then walked up to her menacingly, and shot out it's hand, wrapping around her throat before using it's other hand to continually smash her and hit her, until it chucked her off that tree and into the next one.

Falling off, she tried to get up, but doubled over, holding her ribs. She'd be lucky if they weren't at least cracked.

It slowly walked over to her, ready to deliver another blow.

"Hey monkey!"

Roman was holding a banana he had found, dangling it in front of his face. "Who's a big, terrifying monkey? Come get the banana!"

The Beringel was not amused, and turned back to Trifa, before the banana hit it square on the head, followed up with a cane swing to the face. It bent over a bit, before smashing the ground, knocking them both back. Roman quickly got back up, shooting at it once more, and this shot hit it square in the stomach, knocking it back, and it crashed into several trees, knocking them over, causing a particular big one to fall over, landing straight on it.

Roman blinked. "Did I get it?"

Trifa managed to get back up, her aura healing the blows.

"You might-"

It appeared out of nowhere, and leaped high into the air.

"No, I did not!"

This time, instead of rolling out of the way, Trifa jumped into the air herself, webbing it in the eyes, causing it to lose course and miss Roman completely, knocking over a few other trees. Roman rushed towards his right, and it followed him. Trifa began to jump from tree to tree again. She had a idea, but it required her to get ahead of them first.

When she had finally managed to get in front of them, she jumped down, and immediately spun a web between two trees, creating a kind of rope between them. Roman, realising what she was doing, ran towards it and slid underneath it. The Grimm ran straight for it, and when it realised what it was, it tried to slow down, but it was too late. It tripped over the web, straight into the barrel of Melodic Cugel, which blew it's head off.

It's body crumpled to the floor before dissolving away.

"He wasn't the brightest banana in the bunch now, was he?" Roman remarked before walking away.

Trifa simply rolled her eyes before she followed him.

"So, what now?"

"Firstly, let's get out of this jungle and then we'll worry about that. It's going to be getting dark soon, and I'd rather not have to sleep on the floor with all the creepy crawlies, thank you very much. Not to mention, there might be more of those Grimm lurking around.

She couldn't help but agree. They continued onwards, trudging their way through.

_**Do What we do best **_

**So, I had heard about the whole "music helps you write" thing, and decided to give it a go. **

**I typed in "forest battle music" and clicked on the first thing that came up. And you know what? It actually helped! Maybe I'll try and make it a regular thing…**

**Thanks for reading and have a good day! **


	10. Still time

**Chapter 10: Still time**

_**Do what we do best**_

Roman and Trifa stumbled out of the jungle, onto a pathway. In front of them was a large road, which stretched for what seemed like miles. Roman sighed. He couldn't believe it! Why couldn't they have stumbled into a nice restaurant or something? It would have been far better than this! And it was starting to rain! Seems that even the gods themselves were against them!

The wind was beginning to pick up too! Even better!

"What are we going to do?" Trifa asked. For this time of day, the roads seemed very empty.

"Suppose we should just start walking and hope it takes us somewhere." The two of them set off down the path as it continued to rain.

Trifa found her mind casting back to the White Fang, yet again. Her time in it had been long, nearly eight years. She had met a lot of people, some she would forever treasure in her heart, some she would rather never see again.

_I wonder what Ilia is doing… _

Ilia had always been devoted to their cause. Always out on missions, always fighting. She was even more passionate than maybe Trifa was.

She looked towards Roman, striding our in front of her, cane twirling in his hand. She wondered if the reports of him being racist towards Faunus were all nonsense, and it was simply the White Fang not wanting to work with a human. He certainly didn't seem racist…

Roman was back to thinking about Neo. He didn't want to, but she had boycotted his mind ever since he had seen she'd been flung off into the sky by Red. Somewhere, deep in his heart, he wanted to believe she was alive, but he knew that simply wasn't possible. There had been far too many Grimm for her to possibly dodge them all. She had probably been eaten, and died.

_But I was eaten, and I survived… _

But his situation had been different. The Grimm that had eaten him was killed shortly after. Maybe…

_You've got spirit Red, but this is the real world! _

That was what he had told her, and knowing her, she probably didn't even listen to him.

_The real world is cold! _

That it was. A lifetime of doing everything it took to save his own skin had taught him that.

_The real world doesn't care about spirit! _

Being a nice, optimistic person got you nowhere! How did she not realise that!?

_You want to be a hero? Then play the part and die like every huntsman in history! _

So naive, so idiotic…

He then noticed something up ahead. It appeared to be a petrol station of some description.

And petrol stations usually had corner shops of some description.

"Look over there." He pointed towards it. "Maybe we can get get out of the rain."

Picking up the pace a bit, they both began to run towards it. When they got there, they both walked inside the shop bit.

Desperately trying to dry themselves off, Roman looked in the mirror. He realised with a sudden horror that the hair dye had washed off, changing his hair back to its orange tint.

That wasn't good. If someone recognised him…

_Calm yourself. There probably isn't even anyone here. _

He looked at the counter, and realised there was someone here.

It was a middle aged man, but from the look of things, he was fast asleep, as his head was down on the desk.

But if there was one thing that Roman knew, when people were asleep, that was the best opportunity to steal things.

He began to very gingerly tip toe over to the man.

"Roman? What are you doing?"

Sneaking over to him, he stuck his hand in one of his pockets and began very carefully rummaging around. His hand closed on something metal and hard. He took it out slowly, and the man made a snorting noise, but he didn't wake up.

Looking at his well earned prize, Roman realised it was a set of car keys! Perfect!

"Look what I got!"

"Oh, that'll be useful."

"You bet!"

Now, the most difficult task of all. Finding the car.

He opened the gate that lead to the back of the shop. It was bound to be out here, since he hadn't noticed any cars when they had been walking towards it.

Going out the back, he hit the jackpot. A nice car.

"Come on. Let's go for a road trip." He said to Trifa. Throwing the bag with his indestructible hat into the car, he got into the drivers seat.

Trifa jumped in after him, and closing the door over and putting the wipers on, Roman started the car and pulled out, driving it down the road.

He turned the radio on.

_This will be the day we've waited for, this will be the day we open up the door. _

"That's a old song. I used to listen to that when I was younger." Trifa said.

"Really? I've heard of it, but didn't realise it was that old." Roman replied.

"I used to listen to it after…" Her voice trailed off. She was planning to say "when my mum died", but decided against it.

"After what?"

"Never mind that."

Roman shrugged and switched the channel around.

_There have been mass reports of White Fang attacks in Mistral, Vale, and even Vacuo. I am here in Menagerie with the father of the Belladonna household, Ghira, who stepped down from his leadership position a few years ago. Tell us Ghira, what are your thoughts on this one peaceful organisation? _

"_Well, when I first took over, I wanted to achieve equality through peace, through words, not actions. We held rallies and protests, and while it may not have been working, I was hopeful that one day, my efforts would not be in vain." _

_There have been reports that Sienna Khan is no longer the High Leader. What are your thoughts on this? _

"_All I have to say is, whoever it is, I hope they have the Faunus' best interests at heart." _

"White Fang, bla bla, who cares?" Roman said.

"I care!" Trifa suddenly snapped at him.

"Why? Your not part of the organisation anymore."

"I still support the cause."

"Faunus equality." Roman sighed. "If only I thought that was still possible."

"What did you say?!"

"Woah!" Roman suddenly swerved to the left as a car came rocketing past him. "Watch it there!"

They continued on down the road.

_**Do What we do best **_

"How is your task progressing?" Adam said over his scroll.

"_Calm it down there, Adam love. We've only been out for a day. You can't expect us to find them in a day. Even I'm not that good." _Tock said.

"Don't call me love."

"_Well, you can hardly doing anything about it, can you love?" _

Adam simply sighed. "Let me know when you've found them."

"_Of course. Later love. Oh, and Ilia says hi." _

"_No I-!" _

The call ended. The two doors opened, and Corsac and Fennec entered.

"High Leader, we come with urgent news."

"Speak."

"The Lieutenant has informed us that Vale is completely overrun with Grimm. Any humans that haven't already been killed will be eliminated by them. He would like to retract his forces from there and bring them back to here."

"Very well then. He has my blessing."

Corsac and Fennec nodded, bowed and turned to leave.

"Wait."

"High leader?"

"How is Sienna doing?"

Corsac and Fennec shared a look. "She has became increasingly… frustrated. We suspect she may want to leave the White Fang with you now at the helm."

"Make it clear to her that if she does, she will the suffer the same fate that Blake and Trifa will."

"With all due respect, she was the High Leader for quite a while. Don't you think if she wants to leave, we should respect her wishes?"

"No. We can't take the risk of her giving potential intel away to the enemy."

"I really think…"

"Really think what Corsac?" Adam leaned forward and glared at him.

"Nothing."

"That's what I thought." He waved his hand. "You are both dismissed."

Bowing again, they both left.

"Are we sure he is the one to lead us? He is becoming increasingly… unstable." Corsac commented.

"Perhaps. But we must stick with him for now. If he thinks we're potentially turning against him…" Fennec shuddered at the thought.

"We shall be awaiting the Lieutenant's return then."

_**Do what we do best **_

_The mines were cold, harsh, and hot. Trifa was exhausted, but the thought of that whip meeting her back again kept her going as she pushed the mine cart through. She looked around, and saw the faces of several other Faunus, being whipped and tortured. The sight was gruesome and horrific. _

"_Keep that cart moving little brat!" The familiar sound of a whip being lashed convinced her to keep moving. _

"_Hey, hey, don't do that please! Take me instead!" _

_Looking to her right, she saw a boy, older than her, with red hair and bull horns pointing out of his head, thrown to the ground. A women, assumedly his mum, was looking on teary eyed. _

"_Get back to work, women!" _

"_Leave him alone! He didn't do anything wrong!" _

_The boy wriggled and squirmed and bit one of the humans hands. _

"_Oh, you're a feisty one, huh? Bring out the brand!" _

"_Please, I'm begging you-" _

_The man slapped her across the face. _

_A red hot needle was brought out, and lowered over the boys face. Trifa watched on in horror as it drew closer and closer… _

"_What are you looking at?" A whip across the skin, causing her to cry out in pain. But she couldn't stop watching, watching as they traced the brand across his face… It was terrible. _

"_If you don't start working, the same thing will be happening to you!" _

_She couldn't do it. Tears filled her eyes as they lashed her and beat her again and again, the pain unbearable, relentless. _

_She struggled to stand back up, until she felt two hands clamp down on her shoulders. _

"_Wake up! Wake up!" _

Trifa opened her eyes. The car had been pulled over and Roman had her by the shoulders.

"Calm down, calm down, it's fine…"

"What-"

"You fell asleep, so I decided not to wake you up. But then you started jerking and flailing and screaming. What was that about?"

"It's- nothing. I'm fine now."

"You sure?" He didn't sound convinced.

She offered him a weary smile. "I'm sure."

"Right…" He still wasn't convinced, but he let the subject drop.

He began driving again.

Trifa lay back, trying to control her breathing.

_What even was that? _

That boy… it had to be Adam. It just had to be. But she wasn't there, didn't see him get his brand…

So how was her mind able to relay it so well?

Maybe it was what Ilia and Blake had told her. Adam was always close to them, he'd tell them that information.

Especially Blake…

Blake leaving had ruined everything for him. Torn him apart inside, set him on this dark, unfamiliar path. The radio had said about how a new High Leader had taken over. She could make a pretty good guess and say it was probably Adam.

_Which is why I am going to give you a choice. You can come back with us, and help with Beacon's demise. You will be rewarded handsomely."_

If Adam was the leader of the White Fang…

_"Or, you can continue to run. I won't chase after you. I have far more important matters to attend to. But rest assured, when Beacon has fallen, we will find you. The White Fang does not take to traitors lightly."_

Did that mean he was coming after her? Was he coming to find her, to punish her for her betrayal?

No, he would go after Blake first, right? There was still time, still time to run, still time to hide…

He wouldn't come for her first, she still had time.

She still had time.

_**Do what we do best **_

**Do you have time though Trifa? **

**Thanks for reading and have a good day! **


	11. A single light

**Chapter 11: **

_**Do what we do best**_

"At last! A city!" Roman exclaimed. There was one beginning to form in the distance. "The stars have finally aligned in our favour!"

"About time..." Trifa muttered. She looked as they drew closer to the town. It seemed relatively big.

"So, what do we do when we get there?" She asked.

"Well, first, we'll need to check into a apartment of some kind. Then, we hang around for a while, and figure out what we're going to do from there." He seemed in a much better mood now, whistling as they drew closer.

_Faunus equality… If only I thought that was still possible. _

Is that what he had said? Had she heard him right? Did Roman really think that?

And then there was that nightmare… What had that been about?

_Don't think about it now. Don't think about the White Fang, or Adam. Just focus on what's happening now. _

That was proving to be extremely hard though. Especially after what Adam had said at the Fall of Beacon…

She couldn't help but be worried. He was always one to carry through on threats. It scared her, scared her to think about what would happen. If he came all by himself, could they take him? But no, he wouldn't come all by himself, he was smarter than that.

_It's time I got what I deserved… _

What did he think he deserved? Power? Control? The humans to kneel at their feet and beg for mercy? Justice? Equality? That can't be what he was looking for. No, what he was looking for was her. And Blake.

"Oi, are you daydreaming again?"

"What, no! I was listening."

"What did I just say then?"

"Oi, are you daydreaming again. That's what you said."

"No, I meant before that Little Miss Clever."

"You said that we would hang around for a while and figure out what we're going to do from there." She smirked as Roman sighed very loudly.

"You know what? Doesn't even matter."

They were almost there thankfully. Once they were inside, Roman got straight to work looking for a hotel of some sort. Trifa couldn't be bothered to help. The town was alive and full of people, unlike Vale at the moment. It was still overrun with Grimm, although the huntsmen that had been deployed were slowly working there way through and killing them all.

"If I was a hotel, where would I be?" Roman wondered aloud.

"Roman, you can't be a hotel. It's a stationary building, it can't move or talk or have feelings."

"Are you seriously trying to one up me in the clever department? Because I'm afraid that is not possible."

She smiled and rolled her eyes. He continued driving around.

"Oh come on!" Roman exclaimed. "Does this city seriously have no hotels? I didn't even think a city with no hotels was possible!"

Eventually, he managed to find one. It was a tall building, slapped right in the middle of the city, which wasn't ideal considering Romans' thief status, but it would have to do. He drove into the car park, and parked the car.

"Okay, let's hope the security here isn't too high."

They both got out and walked up to the front door. As soon as they both entered…

"It's Roman Torchwick!"

"The gentleman thief of Vale!"

"The Mad Hatter!"

"The guy with a cane which transforms into a gun! Where can I get one of those?"

"Quick, arrest him!"

"Who's that girl?"

"Is she a Faunus?"

"What's he doing here?"

There was so much shouting and screaming that they were both able to quickly run over to the receptionists desk.

"Thank you everyone! No, I'm not doing autographs! Can you all move out of the way please?"

"Grab him!"

"Stop him!"

Suddenly, Roman fired a shot out of Melodic Cugel, which blew up a nearby painting. Everyone fell quiet quickly.

"Now, I have a announcement to make. I am not actually Roman Torchwick! I am Perry Derry! His secret twin brother."

Gasps went up from within the crowd.

"Twin brother?"

"I didn't know he had a twin brother!"

"Yes! For years, my vile sibling has lied, stole and cheated. But you will all be very happy to know he is now dead!"

A loud cheer went up.

_I can't believe this is actually working. _Roman thought to himself. _How stupid are some people nowadays? _

"So, please everyone, can you all continue with your day to day lives and allow me and my friend to stay here?"

There were murmurs of "Yes" and "Sorry to disturb you."

"Great! On you go then!"

The normal chatter started back up again. Roman turned back to the receptionist.

They rented out the room and were given a key.

_**Do what we do best **_

As soon as they both entered the room, Roman broke out laughing.

"That worked! I can't believe that actually worked!" He fell down onto the couch and continued to laugh. "How stupid are some people? They fell for it! They actually fell for it! I thought we were goners!"

His entire body shook he was laughing so hard. Trifa began to worry he might laugh himself to death. But it was quite funny and she couldn't help sniggering a bit.

"Right, right, you want to calm down?"

"Oh, oh-ho! That has to be the greatest thing that has happened ever!" He then immediately thought:

_What about meeting Neo? _

The laughter soon stopped after that. He sat up on the couch, and quietly continued chuckling.

Trifa took a look around the apartment. It was small, well kept, and quite clean surprisingly. There was a kitchen bit, a living room bit, a bedroom and a bathroom. Not the grandest accommodation she had ever stayed in, but it would do.

"Man, Perry Derry for the win!" He put his fist into the air. "My brilliant mind thinks up of another brilliant name!"

_Another brilliant name? _Trifa thought. _Oh joy. Wonder what his others were. _

_**Do what we do best **_

"Where could they be?"

Ilia was rather quiet. She was mainly leaving it up to Tock to figure it out.

"Come on now dear. Help me out a bit here. You know them two better than I do, where would they be?"

That was the problem. Ilia honestly didn't know. Tock sighed.

"Well, we're hardly getting anywhere with this. We might as well ask someone."

Bringing up the images of Trifa and Blake on her scroll, Tock walked into the nearest shop and rang the bell at the desk.

"One second!" A man called out from the back. Tock began tapping her fingers against the desk.

When he came out, he was taken aback by Tock's Faunus features, but came over anyway.

"How can I help you?"

"I was actually wondering if you had seen someone." He placed her scroll on the desk. The man looked at it, and his eyes widened immediately.

"I haven't seen her," He pointed to the image of Blake. "But I have seen her.." He motioned to Trifa. Tock grinned.

"Have you now? Where?"

"She was on a boat I was on, with that Torchwick guy. They both got off and got away."

"Where was the boat heading?"

"Mistral. Right here."

"So there in Mistral somewhere?"

"Yes, your in the right continent. Just need to work your way through all the different cities."

"Thank you very much."

"Your welcome."

Tock came back out to Ilia sitting on a bench. "There here. In Mistral somewhere."

Ilia's eyes widened. "Serious?"

"Yep." Tock sat next to her. "It's just where in Mistral that might be the problem. I'll let Adam know we're in the right place."

She phoned Adam. As she filled him in, Ilia wondered what she would do when she saw Trifa again. Could she really bring her to Adam? He would kill her!

But did she really have a choice?

_**Do what we do best**_

"Here, why don't you wear this?" Roman held up a "Don't do anything to the cook" apron. Trifa rolled her eyes. Roman had unsurprisingly given her the task of making them something to eat, and she had went out to one of the stores and bought stuff. He had made the excuse that his cooking was the most "vile rotten" thing to ever exist.

She wasn't exactly a master chief, but she knew the basics, so that was something.

_Maybe I should pour loads of chilli sauce on his… _

That would be funny. The image of Roman trying desperately to cool his mouth down gave her great pleasure indeed.

But there was one problem. She didn't have any chilli sauce. That was a shame.

"Is it nearly finished?"

"Yes Roman."

"Good." He came walking in. "I'm starving. What are you making anyway?"

"Chicken curry."

"Or should I say, spider curry?" He began laughing at his own bad joke.

"Oh haha, get it, cause I'm a spider Faunus, and a chicken is a animal? Yes Roman, it's hilarious. You must be very proud of yourself."

"I'm always very proud of myself. Why wouldn't I be?"

"If you don't stop, this boiling hot water is going over your head." She held up the saucepan threateningly.

"It wouldn't do anything. My hat is indestructible." He readjusted it for the 50th time.

"Maybe your semblance is linked to your hat." Trifa jokingly suggested.

"Hmm, well I haven't unlocked mines yet, so it's a possibility."

She looked around in surprise. "Have you not?"

"No."

"Oh, well I haven't either." She had given up trying a long time ago.

"Fair enough." He walked towards the table and sat down. She began to put the food onto the plates. She gave herself slightly more. After all, she had made it.

Bringing the two plates out, she set her own down first, just to annoy him, and then very slowly set his down.

She sat down herself, removing her gloves, and began to eat it. She was expecting a loud "Ugh, this is disgusting!", but it didn't come.

"You know", Roman said. "This isn't half bad. Where did you learn how to cook?"

"It's not that hard. You just read a recipe and make the stuff. But since men don't cook, you wouldn't understand."

"Men don't cook? If that's not sexist, then I don't know what is."

"It's true though. When I was in the White Fang, and we used to hide out in apartments and things, it was always the women doing the cooking."

"Why did you join the White Fang anyway?" Roman has asked this before, but he was still curious.

He was expected a snappy "None of your business" response, but instead she simply sighed, and looked at him.

"I used to work in the labour mines in Atlas." Roman spat out his drink.

"Come again?"

"I used to work in the labour mines. Not for all my life, but when I was about ten years old, my mom died suddenly, from a heart attack. Then, my dad and I were sought out and brought to the mines. I worked there for four years. It was….horrific. I'll never forget those times. But one day, we all heard of a new organisation. One called the White Fang, who were infiltrating the mines and removing Faunus from them. It gave me hope in a very dark time."

"Not long after, me and a group of young Faunus were saved from those mines, and we joined them. This was when Ghira was still the leader. Sienna was there too. She taught us how to fight, how to defend ourselves, how to use our traits to our advantage. So, when I was fully trained, I became a full time member."

"When Ghira stepped down, Sienna ordered us to go wild. We weren't going to achieve it through peace, but through violence. But there was one event that I think was the main turning point in me leaving, as well as Adam of course."

"It was during a mission. We went after a train, a train full of people on it. We wrecked havoc. Killing people left, right and centre. Whenever I saw a young boy trying to crawl away, I went after him. But when it came to stabbing him-"

"You couldn't do it."

She sighed. "Yes. I saw the fear in his eyes, and I just couldn't. It was in that moment, I realised I didn't want this. I didn't want to turn into someone like Adam. I didn't want to be a monster. Not long after that, Yuma tried to run. But Adam killed him. At that moment, I knew it was time to run. I couldn't stick around anymore."

She fell silent.

"Look, I'm not great at the whole sympathy thing-" Roman began to say.

"And you shouldn't feel sympathy. I have killed humans. I have killed mothers, fathers, sons and daughters. You shouldn't feel bad for me."

"Maybe so, but you had your reasons for it. And at least you stopped before you became a second Adam."

"Maybe your right. Also, Roman?"

"Yes?"

"Thanks."

He looked confused. "For what?"

She smiled at him. "For being here."

"Oh, well, um, your welcome?"

She finished her food, and stood up, picking up her plate and walking away. Roman watched her.

_A single light, a single friend huh? _

_**Do what we do best**_

**I love One Thing. It and Lionised are probably my two favourite songs in the V6 soundtrack. **

**Thanks for reading and have a good day! **


	12. A single friend

**Chapter 12: A single friend**

This was it. She had finally found her. Little Red. Neo watched Ruby, and three other people she had never seen before. A blonde haired boy with a sword and shield. A orange haired girl with a massive hammer. A black haired boy with a pink lock running through. But she wasn't concerned with those three. All she cared about was Ruby. Right here. In front of her. And she was going to kill her, no matter what it took. No matter how much of her own blood was spilled, she would kill her. It was time for retribution.

The four of them didn't even notice her as she silent glided down from the trees and came to a stop not too far away. She slowly creeped forward, ready to strike. Until she accidentally stepped on a twig. She quietly jumped back.

"What is it Ren?" It was the hammer girl that had just spoken.

"I thought I heard something." He stopped and took a good look around him.

"It was probably just your imagination. Come on, Ruby and Jaune are going on!"

Ren was still a bit uneasy, but he followed his friend.

Neo took a deep breath and continued to follow them, silently. She couldn't afford to lose this opportunity, not when she was this close. To her revenge. To what she deserved.

She followed them to a abandoned town, and knew that this was her moment. There was no cover here, nowhere for Little Red to hide. The other three would fight alongside her, and she was prepared for that. But she wouldn't let them stand in her way. She dropped down from the top of the building, quietly. She began to sneak up on them. They were chattering amongst themselves, but she wasn't listening. Forward she crept.

Closer… and closer… and…

All of a sudden, the black haired boy in green spun around, as if he had heard her.

"Look out, behind us!"

They all turned round and spotted her.

"Hey, are you-"

But she was already sprinting towards them, blade in hand. She may have missed her opportunity to sneak up on them, but there was no way she was letting them make the first move. She went straight for Ruby first, slashing at her quickly, but was forced to back up as Jaune swiped his sword at her. Ducking underneath a hammer swing, she then took out Ren with a kick. Swiping underneath Jaune's shield, she flipped over his head and went for Ruby again, but was unable to single her out, as Nora forced her back with a smash to the ground.

Growling, she stood back up.

"We're not looking for a fight!" Jaune shouted.

"Wait, you're the girl that Torchwick was with!" Ruby said. "On the ship. You have his… hat."

Not being amused with small talk, Neo charged again. This time, Ren went to meet her, but he was ignored when she jumped over his head. She dodged Nora's swing, ducked underneath Jaune's swipe, and was on Ruby in a whirlwind of blows. Knocking her back, she made to slash her throat, but Jaune jumped in front of Ruby, holding up his shield. Her blade glanced off it, and Jaune was soon taken out with a kick to the knee. Ren and Nora came in from both sides, and she leaped into the air, dodging both of them, before coming back down, landing on the hilt of Crescent Rose, and disarming Nora quickly when she was able to yank her hammer from her hand and kick her in the back.

Ren and Ruby tried to double team her, but it was clear their teamwork expertise was low, as Ruby was sent flying back. Ren went on the offensive with slashes and kicks, but she easily dodged all of them, and used her semblance to distract him momentarily, before taking him out as well.

Finally, Ruby was all hers. She deflected a few shots before yanking her scythe out of her hands and throwing it away. Nora tried to come at her again, but Neo cartwheeled over her slam and slashed her in the stomach.

"Nora!" Ren cried out. But Neo didn't care about her. All she cared about was the girl in front of her. Who had killed Roman.

If Neo's emotions hadn't been so high, and if she had been paying more attention, perhaps she would have heard the sound of a crow circling overhead. Perhaps she would have then heard the sound of that crow transforming into a man. Perhaps then she wouldn't have been so shocked when her attempted kill was blocked. By Qrow Branwen himself.

Jumping back, she scowled. _What is he doing here? _

Neo had been so close. So close. But now this stupid bird man had taken away her chance. Her chance, the one that that had been rightfully hers.

"Uncle Qrow." He looked at Ruby for a second, grinned, and then looked back at Neo.

"Look little girl, I don't know who you are, or what your doing, but you need to leave my niece alone."

So she was his niece. In a way, it would be even funnier when she killed him too. She smiled.

"I don't know what's so funny-"

She rushed him. Qrow deflected her first shot, and she tried to punch him in the face, but he grabbed her fist and threw her to the side. Landing on her feet, Neo tried to plant her boot in his skull, but he was quicker, and Qrow grabbed her by the foot and slammed her into the earth. He then tried to swipe at her, but Neo rolled to the side, and she deflected his follow up blow. Standing back up, Qrow came at her again, and she ducked underneath his shot, but he was quicker once again, kneeing her in the stomach, and kicking her back.

Neo was outmatched. She couldn't beat Qrow. But she was so enraged, so emotional, that she didn't care. She would kill him, and then kill Ruby.

Qrow ran at her, and jumped into the air, bringing Harbringer down, and she brought her blade up to meet him, and the two locked blades. They made eye contact, and Qrow smirked. Jumping back up, Neo looked above her as a plank of wood threatened to crush her. She slashed through it easily, but Qrow took several shots at her, catching her off guard, and she barely deflected them.

Snarling like a wild animal, she leapt into the air, and used her semblance to distract him, but it was all in vain as he was able to catch her with a punch to the lip and a Harbringer strike to the stomach.

She was then sent flying back. Putting her hand to her lip, she drew it away and saw there was blood on her glove. There was also a cut along her stomach. Travelling all this time, no food, no rest, had really taken it's toll on her aura.

But she didn't care. Struggling to her feet, she grinned through bloody lips and began chuckling to herself.

"What kind of a monster are you?" Qrow asked. They clashed again, and this time Neo was able to get the upper hand when she slid in between this legs and threw him to the ground. She continued to laugh maniacally.

Qrow dodged her follow up kick, and she tried to swing at him, but unbelievably, he grabbed her parasol and disarmed her. Bringing his weapon back, he struck her hard in stomach. She hit the ground so hard, some of the rock broke. Lying there, she could feel her aura flickering. With no weapon, this would have been the best time to get out of there. But Neo wasn't thinking straight. She had basically gone insane.

_Does he think I'm a monster?! I'll show him just how mad I really am! _

With no Roman to hold her back, Neo was a dog off a chain. Laughing out loud, she ran at Qrow for the final time, with no real way of defending herself. He dropped his weapon, cracked his knuckles, and punched her in the face. She continued to grin and laugh as he hit her, again and again. He then rocked her with a knee to the groin, and he grabbed her by the hair, and held her up.

"Do you think this is funny? Is this all a laugh and a joke to you?" He threw her back down. Standing back up for the last time, she pointed out her finger and made a "Come at me" gesture.

She welcomed the pain that she felt when he hit her with a barrage of attacks so unbelievably fast that even if she had tried, she couldn't dodge them. Qrow finished it up with a combination of punches, and hit her so hard that the whole world faded to black.

_**Do what we do best**_

Roman was whistling to himself as he pushed the shopping cart around the store. Now that everyone knew he was actually the twin brother of Roman Torchwick, not the man himself, it meant that he could walk around in public, a very welcome change from his old life. No more disguises. It was going to be great. He had been tasked with shopping for groceries this time around, and as much as he had grumbled and whined about it, Trifa was pretty persistent. It was fair, considering she had bought stuff yesterday, but Roman didn't get this far by being fair.

He threw a couple of sauces and pasta into the shopping cart, and continued on. He came to the ice cream section, and a scene caught this eye. A man had taken out some ice cream. Neapolitan flavoured ice cream. When Roman took a quick look in the freezer, he realised that was the last carton left.

_That's mine!_

That ice cream was rightfully his. That was the flavour Neo had loved eating, unsurprisingly. He had quite enjoyed it himself. Everyone loved it. Trifa probably would too. He was going to get it. He had stolen money from the highest security banks possible, stealing ice cream from a man should not be that hard. He waited until he had placed it in his trolley, and had turned back to one of the shelves. Roman began to slowly creep forward. The man suddenly turned around, and Roman stopped, pretending to be interested in noodles.

When he turned back round, Roman slowly began to go forward again. Why was this so tense? It was like taking candy from a baby. He turned around again, and this time Roman opened the freezer, looking at the other flavours. Then…

_Got ya. _Out it came easily. With it now in his hands, he made a quick run back to the cart and placed it in. He then pushed the shopping cart away quickly, whistling extremely loudly, not turning around to see if he had noticed it was gone. He went around the store, picked up a few other things, and then brought it to the checkout. It was one of those fancy "you can do it yourself" one's. As he scanned the items, he found himself wondering about the White Fang. After what Trifa had told him yesterday-

He sighed loudly as "_There is something wrong with this item. Please wait for assistance" _came up on the screen. Every time! So much for amazing technology! Couldn't even scan things right. When a member of staff had sorted it out, and he had scanned everything, he put it into one of the bags provided, and turned to leave. He walked out of the store and began to head back to the hotel. But yes, the White Fang with Adam now at the helm would certainly not be taking their cause lightly. Lot's of humans were about to die, hopefully not including him.

It was all pointless anyway. Faunus equality was simply not possible, he had accepted that a long time ago. Human's would always have the better weapons, the better tactics. It didn't matter if Faunus had claws, could fly, or could climb trees. The humans would win every time. They were the superior race, no matter what Adam Taurus thought.

_Poor Trifa. If she really did work in the dust mines… _

He felt sympathy course through him. He had heard about how the conditions were in those mines. It had sounded like pure utter torture.

He made it back to the hotel, walked upstairs and entered the room.

"Honey, I'm home!" He announced in a very exaggerated fashion. No reply.

_Huh, is she not here? _

Taking a quick scan around, it didn't seem like it. She must have gone out or something.

_I wasted two seconds of my life saying "Honey I'm home." I'll never get those two seconds back… _

_**Do what we do best **_

**Truly tragic. **

**Thanks for reading and have a good day!**


	13. Calm before the storm

**Chapter 13: Calm before the Storm**

_**Do what we do best**_

Roman was awakened by a nudge on the arm. He snorted a bit, and then opened his eyes. Rubbing them, he saw Trifa standing in front of him.

"Oh, hello Archane." He said sleepily.

"Did you fall asleep?" She asked.

"Maybe."

"Maybe? I think that's a definitely." She pulled his hat over his head playfully.

"Hey, I wasted two seconds of my life saying "Honey, I'm home" yesterday, and you weren't even here to see it! Now I'm never going to get those two seconds back. This is all your fault."

"And you've wasted even more of your time sprawled out on the couch. Bunch up a bit."

Roman pushed his hat up. "Fine. But it's still your fault. Don't roll your eyes at me!" Trifa sat down.

"Stop whinging like a five year old and maybe I won't need to."

"A five year old? How am I acting like a five year old?"

"Oh I don't know, how about "Oh, Trifa, it's all your fault. I'm complaining about something completely irrelevant that won't affect me in any way shape or form."

"Don't mock me. Only I'm allowed to mock people. Did you just roll your eyes again?!"

"Maybe." Roman grabbed a cushion lying next to him and whacked her in the head with it.

"That'll teach you-Oof!" She had hit him with one of her own.

"Right, that's it! I'm going to teach you what happens when you mess with Roman Torchwick!" He swung another one around and she jumped up off the couch and backed away. She was laughing, which just served to anger Roman even more, as he threw one at her face, a solid hit which flattened her to the floor. She continued to laugh.

"What is so funny?!"

"You literally hit me with a cushion! And you say you don't act like a five year old?" Roman grumbled, mainly because he didn't want to answer cause he knew she was right. And he knew that she knew that. She smiled at him and sat down.

"So, uh, do you want to like, do anything?"

"I would like to do lots of things. Rob a shop. Kill any girl wearing red. Smoke a cigar. But I assume that's not what you meant."

"I meant do you want to do anything, like, fun?"

"Fun? Enlighten me on what you would like to do that would be considered fun."

"I dunno, watch a movie, play a game-"

"Play a game? What kind of game?"

"Anything really I suppose. How about… oh, I have a idea! Have you ever heard of three truths and a lie?"

"I have, yes."

"So, would you like to play it?"

Roman considered that for a second. He was a thirty five year old man, should he really be playing games, something only little kids did? Then, again, it would give him something to do to take his mind off Neo..

"Sure, let's go for it."

"Okay, do you want to go first?"

"Nah, you can go first."

"Right, okay…" She thought about it for a moment.

"I once accidentally plastered Yuma to a wall using my webs."

_That could be true… _

"For a short while in the White Fang, I dyed my hair black."

_Edgelord Archane. That could be true too. _

"I used to have a crush on Adam."

_That is a lie. _

"You used to have a crush on Adam is a lie, definitely."

"Wrong." Roman raised a eyebrow.

"Yeah, I'm not very proud of the fact that I used to have a crush on him. That was back when I first joined."

"What was the lie then?"

"I would never dye my hair black. I'm not a black widow spider."

"Rightfully so."

"Your turn." Trifa crossed her legs.

_Hmm… Three things about me… _It was a surprisingly difficult task.

"I used to be in a band called Light The Torch."

"My cane is called Melodic Cugel."

"My final words to Ruby Rose were "Lie, steal, cheat, and survive!" before I was then eaten by a Grimm."

Trifa looked at him thoughtfully. _I wonder if she'll get it… _

"I can't imagine you being in a band, but I don't know how you would survive getting eaten by a Grimm…"

Roman simply grinned at her. He was pretty certain that she wasn't going to get it.

"So, I'm going to go with the getting eaten by a Grimm is a lie?"

"Wrong. The band one was the lie."

"How did you survive getting eaten by a Grimm?"

"Well, it's actually rather simple. My aura was still up, the Grimm was killed shortly after, so I just hopped out. Quite ironic though how I said "survive". She's so unbelievably dumb that she probably thinks I died. Having a joke with her equally stupid friends, "Oh, haha, get it, he said survive and then he died."

"Who even is Ruby Rose?"

Roman sighed. "You were on the train when we ran it into Vale, correct?"

"Yes?"

"Remember the little girl in red with the big scythe?"

"Vaguely. I remember watching as you taunted her, that's about it."

"You also fought the Ice Queen on that train, didn't you?"

"The Ice Queen? Do you mean Weiss Schnee?"

"Her official name is Weiss Schnee. Her actual name is the Ice Queen."

"Uh, okay. Well, yeah, I did. For doing nothing in her pimped out mansion except probably admire herself in a mirror, having people to cater to her every poor need, while her wretched human of a father continues to discriminate against our people, who have done nothing wrong to the SDC, yet they throw them in-"

"Woah, slow down."

She sighed. "Sorry, I just particularly despise her company." She clenched and unclenched her fist. Roman patted her on the shoulder.

"Rightfully so."

"Anyway, despite everything I just said, she could fight awfully well. It probably didn't help that my emotions at seeing her were at a all time high…"

"I sincerely hope that one day, the Schnee Dust Company comes crashing down." Roman said.

"That's one of the main things that Adam promised we were going to do. Destroy them, go to war on Atlas." She hung her head low, and stared at her open palms. "I can't believe that I once thought we could defeat the Atlas Military."

"I've been sought after by them a fair share of times, and it's been some of the closet times I've came to being captured. They do not mess around."

"I know that firsthand. We tried to raid a Atlas military base once, and got shot down. I was one of the few who made it out alive. It wasn't pretty. Lot's of Faunus lost there lives that day…"

Roman looked out the window, unsure of what to say. It was rather busy for this time of day.

"Now with Adam at the helm, more lives will probably be lost." Roman turned his gaze to her. She sounded on the verge of breaking down and crying. He needed to change the subject and fast.

"Uh, how about we play another game?" She seemed only to happy to oblige.

"Got any good ones?" Roman thought for a second. There was one he had, but he wasn't sure it was the best idea…

_Ah, to hell with it. What's the worst that could happen? _

"Truth or dare."

Trifa stood up. "Alright then. I'll ask you first. Truth or dare?"

_No way am I doing truth. Knowing her, she'll probably ask a very private question. "_Dare."

"Okay… Ah, I've got one. Attempt to dance for thirty seconds." Trifa was mainly doing this because she needed a good laugh after recalling that military base raid. But what she got was quite different.

Roman didn't even protest, he stood up, took his hat off, and then flicked it back onto to his head. He took up a pose, and stayed like that for a second. Then he started to dance.

Trifa was expecting him to flop all around the place hilariously, but it was very, very, different. Roman could actually dance. And he could dance very well.

The body motions were so expertly choreographed, and performed so fluently well, that it was a wonder he hadn't ditched the criminal life a long time ago, and taken up dancing as his career. It was the most beautiful thing Trifa had ever witnessed.

_Is he… _He was moonwalking. Simply magnificent. How he had learned to do that was a question that would probably never be answered, and didn't need to be answered. What a sight to behold.

He finished with spinning around in a circle, throwing his hat up and catching it on his head. Trifa was so amazed she forgot to clap.

"Thank you, thank you." He bowed.

"Where did you learn to-"

"That is a secret." He grinned at her. "Now, truth or dare?"

"Truth."

"Okay then." He sat back down and began to think. Trifa watched him, and then began to feel really worried as the biggest smile began to come over his face.

"Now this, this is a good one." He looked at her. "Would you kiss me, right here, right now?"

"W-What?"

"You heard me."

"Um, no, no I wouldn't! No offence!"

"Are you sure?"

"Y-Yes!"

"I sense some hesitation with that answer."

"Roman, please stop! I wouldn't kiss you right here, right now, okay?"

"Sure your sure?"

"Yes!"

"I don't believe you. I am far too good looking for you to not kiss me."

"Roman, I'm begging you, stop!"

"After all, I do have-"

"Stop!"

He leaned back, with a disappointed expression on his face. "Calm yourself. I was joking, I didn't actually expect you to." Trifa crossed her arms and glared at him.

"Right, your turn." She said. "Truth or dare?"

"I think I'll go with a truth this time."

_A truth huh? Time to make him feel really uncomfortable. _

She thought for a moment, but no ideas sprung to mind. Nothing that would make him feel really uncomfortable. Then, all of a sudden, she had one. This was going to be good.

"What lie have you told that would hurt someone close to you if they knew?"

Roman sighed. "On different terms, I wouldn't tell you. But considering that Neo is now dead, I might as well tell you. But just to give you a bit of context, I met Neo when I was working for a criminal mastermind. His name was Randy. She and her parents were both working for him. But one day, the military found us and they stormed our base. I managed to get myself and her out of there alive, but I told her that her parents were shot and killed by them. That was a lie. I know there still out there somewhere, because not too long after when I was out and about, I saw them. She obviously wasn't with me at the time, but I didn't tell her that I had saw them. I knew that if I did, she would want to go after them. But at that time, we couldn't afford that. So I lied to her. It's probably the only lie I have ever regretted telling."

He looked at her. "So there you go. Biggest lie I've ever told."

"Woah… Roman-"

"I would really rather not talk about it ,okay?"

"Alright then." She was still curious, but she would respect his wishes.

"Thanks. So, truth or dare?"

_Do I really want to go with truth again? _After that last question, not really. But a dare could be ten times worse. Truth was probably the safer option.

_Here we go again. _"Truth."

"Did you ever kiss anyone in the White Fang?"

"ROMAN!"

_**Do what we do best **_

**Roman Torchwick, prying into your romantic life since the dawn of time itself. **

**Bit more of a relaxed chapter this time around. Figured it would be best after all the crazy Neo stuff last chapter. **

**But read the chapter title again, and you could probably figure out what is going to happen next. I shall say nothing more. **

**Thanks for reading and have a good day! **


	14. The Storm

**Chapter 14: The Storm**

_If what I hear is true, and Adam is the new High Leader of the White Fang, then I simply cannot allow this to stand. He is still young, brash, and reckless. He will not- _

Adam took the nearest thing he could find, which happened to be his weapon, and threw it at the nearby radio as hard as he could. It scared a few nearby White Fang members, who turned to look at him.

"What are you looking at?!" He snarled at them. They quickly backed away and left the room.

How dare Ghira think he wasn't worthy of leading the White Fang? How dare he speak about him like that? The absolute nerve of that idiot!

He hadn't heard anything from Tock or Ilia in a while. It was time to check up on them. Taking out his scroll, he phoned them.

"_Hello? Adam love, is that you?" _

"Don't call me love."

"_Dear me, someone's in a bad mood." _

"Have you found Trifa yet?"

"_I believe we may have. The guy I spoke to a few days ago mentioned how she was with Roman Torchwick. I saw Roman Torchwick in a store recently. We think we know where there staying. We are heading to that apartment now." _

"And you didn't attack him to make the retrieval of Trifa easier?" Adam's voice rose.

"_Whoa, whoa, no need to raise your voice. He was in a public place Adam! We couldn't very well kill him in front of all those people." _

Adam hadn't even thought of that. "Very well then. Remember, you must not kill her. You must bring her to me, alive."

"_Of course. Is that all you want to pester me about?" _

"That will be all Tock."

"_Alright, later dear." _She hung up.

_**Do what we do best**_

"I believe this may be the place." Ilia said as Tock put her scroll away.

"Let's hope it is."

"So, uh, do we just walk in and take her out then?"

"We need to do this as quickly and efficiently as possible. If we are too slow, we'll be caught."

Ilia nodded her head. "I understand."

"Good stuff. Come on, time to catch us a spider."

_**Do what we do best**_

"You have retractable spikes in your hat that come out when you throw it?" Trifa didn't believe him.

"Yep." Roman crossed his arms.

"No you do not, you wouldn't be able to wear it then! Prove it."

"I will." He stood up, took his hat off, and then threw it. Nothing happened. No spikes of doom came out. It just flew like a plain old hat, and came to a stop.

"I knew it."

"What's the first bit in my motto?"

"You have a motto?"

Roman blinked. "Have I not told you it?"

"I don't think so, no."

"Well, it's "Lie, steal, cheat, and survive."

"Oh, so you lied."

"Stating the obvious there." Roman said. "What was the White Fang's motto? Was it like "Kill all the humans? "Annihilate everything and everyone?"

"Hold on, you were in charge of the White Fang, you should know!"

Roman shrugged and lit a cigar. "Well, I don't. All I know is that during that time, they put up posters all over the underground with my face on it, and I'm pointing a finger and then it says "I want you for the White Fang."

"Yeah, because I'm sure your face would convince people to join the White Fang." Trifa said with a roll of the eyes.

"I have a very nice face, what's your point?"

Then, all of a sudden, there was a suspiciously loud creak in one of the air vents above, followed by someone cursing extremely loudly. Both Roman and Trifa looked up.

"Uh, what was that?" Trifa said.

"I have no idea."

"Is it broke or something?"

"Tock, is it really the best idea to be crawling through the air vents? It's awfully tight in here!" A voice said. Trifa backed up. She recognised that voice.

"Last time I checked, air vents don't speak." Roman commented. "Not that I've ever had the need to check to see if my air vents spoke or not, because why would I? Air vents don't speak."

"I'm telling you Ilia, this is going work! We knock out Torchwick, grab Trifa, get out of there, bring her back to Adam, I get my pay check, and everything is fine."

"No…" Trifa's voice was barely above a whisper. "Ilia?"

Roman backed up, and grabbed Melodic Cugel. Aiming it at the air vent, he fired it. It blew up, and Tock and Ilia came tumbling out, in a cloud of smoke and debris.

They both stood up, dusting themselves off. Ilia looked over at Trifa.

"Ilia? What are you doing here?"

"You know her?" Roman looked at Tock. "And dear me, those are some awfully sharp teeth you've got right there. Might want to see a dentist."

"I am not interested in hearing you opinion about my Faunus heritage." Tock said with a slight smile. "What I am interested in though, is her." She pointed one of her swords at Trifa.

"What do you want with her?"

"Personally, I don't want anything with her. However, Adam Taurus does." Tock grinned at Trifa. "To be precise, he wants her head on a silver platter."

"Adam?" Trifa looked down at the ground when Roman looked at her. "What does Adam-"

"She hasn't told you, has she? Little ole miss spider over here ran away from him at the Battle of Beacon, and needless to say, he wasn't very happy."

Ilia was staring down at her feet, refusing to meet Trifa's eyes.

"So, we were tasked with hunting her down and bringing her to him. Now then Mister Wick-"

_Mister Wick? What kind of name is that? _Roman knew he didn't have time to ponder over that.

"-I am going to give you two choices. You can either hand her over, and we'll leave you alone. Or, you can refuse to hand her over, and that's when things will have to get ugly." Her grip tightened on her weapons.

Roman looked to Trifa and then back to Tock. He took a step towards Tock.

"I'll hand her over." He said. Tock smiled.

"Seems like your smarter than you look."

Roman turned and walked back to Trifa. "Roman, no, please don't-"

Roman put her arms around her, to look like he was giving her a hug. He dropped his voice to a whisper.

"Whenever I say "Archane" you need to duck. Got it?"

"What, why-"

"Just do it." He let go of her, praying to the gods she would do what he said. He turned her around, and gently pushed her towards Tock, who grabbed her roughly by the arm.

"Come on then spider girl. Let's head out."

"Hey, hold on a second" Roman held up a hand. "Is your name Ilia?" He pointed to her.

"Well, uh, yeah."

"What did you call Trifa while she was in the White Fang?"

"What, what do you mean?"

"Did you like, give her nickname, or did you just call her by her own name?"

"I just, called her by her name. Why would I call her anything else?"

"You people are all so boring. Personally, I like to call her…" He looked straight at Trifa and winked. "Archane."

Trifa wrenched herself free from Tock's grip, and then Roman fired a shot. It struck Tock square in the chest, sending her flying straight out the window. Ilia loudly gasped, and looked at the two of them.

"Ilia, please-" Trifa reached her hand out towards her. "Just-" Tock suddenly leapt back into the room, but she didn't go for them. Instead, she pulled out her large stopwatch.

"You've done it now. I gave you a chance-" She pointed to Roman. "And you blew it. So, have the pleasure of knowing that these-"

Roman and Trifa both watched as Tock set the stopwatch to a minute. A feeling of immediate dread settled over the both of them.

"-are the last sixty seconds of your life."

_**Do what we do best**_

"_Now remember Jaune, exactly as we practiced-" _

Jaune swung his sword as Pyrrah's video played on his scroll screen. He had managed to convince the others to get some rest, and had promised them that he would keep an eye on Neo. Qrow hadn't been too happy with the idea, but Ruby had managed to convince him. Neo was currently tied down with some rope they had managed to snag, and the rope was looped around two rocks either side of him, ensuring she couldn't move. The bowler hat which she had been wearing was placed neatly on a rock next to him.

_Come on, come on! Why doesn't it feel like I'm improving? _

He had certainly gotten better thanks to Pyrrah, but he was still nowhere near the level of any of his teammates.

_It's so unfair! _

In a moment of frustration, he hurled his sword at a rock, making a loud clanging noise, and sat down on a nearby tree trunk, putting his head in his hands.

_Why Pyrrah, why did you have to die on me… I need you. _

He turned and went to grab his sword and try again, but then he realised that the noise had woken Neo up. She fixed her eyes on him, and then started struggling to break the rope.

"There's no point in doing that, your just going to hurt yourself." She spat at him, and continued to struggle. He sighed, deciding to just ignore her, and continue training. Picking his sword back up, he put the video back on and continued to practice.

He swung, again and again, and again, and again, and again…

This was what he was going to have to do if he was going to get better. He would not let Pyrrah's death be in vain. He would continue to improve, he would get better, he would become a warrior like his friends.

Then, the loud sound of sobbing broke his concentration. He looked around, confused, and then realised Neo was crying. He looked at her, and immediately felt a pang of sympathy flow through him. He was reminded of one of his younger sisters, and wanted nothing more than to put his arms around her, and tell her it was going to be okay.

_Stop it Jaune. She's trying to trick you, trying to get you to unbind her, so then she can kill you. _

It was a very simple trick, and he wasn't going to fall for it. But then he realised, she wasn't even looking at him. He followed her gaze, and realised she was looking at the bowler hat. Then she fixed her tear stained eyes on him, and tried to push herself off the ground. She didn't get very far.

"Please… give me…. it." She then immediately fell back, like talking had been too much for her to handle.

_The hat? She wants the hat? Okay… _

It was only a hat, not much to it right? Inwardly shrugging, he picked it up and brought it over to her, and she motioned to the top of her head. He leaned down and gently set it on. Standing back up, he flicked through more of Pyrrah's videos.

He set his scroll back down, and continued to practice under the moonlight, while Neo silently continued to weep.

_**Do what we do best **_

**Heartbreaking stuff. Also, I somehow got 119 views last chapter. Whoa, that's impressive. Thanks a lot everyone! **

**Anyway, thanks for reading and have a good day! **


	15. Feed the Croc

**Chapter 15: Tick Tock, Feed the Croc. **

Roman went flying out the window and landed on the street with a thud. Tock leapt out after him, as a loud ticking noise filled the air, and he noticed her flash a pale yellow colour for a second.

Roman got back up to his feet as Tock came towards him, and he was able to narrowly dodge her first strike, blocking her second, and being pushed back on the third. He noticed Trifa and Ilia fighting out of the corner of his eye, but he couldn't focus on that right now. He swung his cane like a golf club, a hard blow to the temple that should have done some serious damage, but instead bounced off harmlessly, like the golf ball had just hit a wall and bounced right off. He took note of the fact she shimmered that pale yellow colour again when he hit her.

_Darn, is that her semblance or something? _

Tough skin? Invincibility? There were a few options. Tock spun on her back foot and attempted to roundhouse kick him in the chest, but he was able of bring up the handle of Melodic Cugel to counter it. That damn ticking noise was really beginning to infuriate him.

He tried to smack her again, but once again, no damage was inflicted, and she tanked his shot, head butting him in the chest in response, staggering him, before she planted a boot in his face, knocking him back.

They eyed each other up for a spilt second, that ticking was still going. Then, a sudden thought struck Roman.

_What if that stopwatch is connected to her semblance? Maybe it only lasts for a minute? _

It was a sudden thought, and probably a foolish one. But with no clear way of hurting this insane crocodile lady, it was his only real option. Turning around, he began to make a run across the nearby road. Nobody had seemed to realise that there was a fight going on somehow. Sprinting straight out on the road, he nearly got ran over by a passing car, but was able to vault over it and continued to run. Tock was right behind him, as a loud car horn told him as she leapt over it. He ran down the path, avoiding a few people who were walking along.

"Hey, watch it-Oof!" Tock was not so kind, simply deciding to run through the people and not around them, knocking several poor innocent bystanders over.

She leaped up into the air and came spiralling down, and he was barely able to roll to the side and fire a shot from his cane and keep on running. His shot had left a huge hole in the pavement, and Tock came charging through the plume of smoke it had kicked up. Looking up at one of the rooftops, Roman caught the flash of Ilia's whip and the sound of guns being fired.

_**Do What We Do Best**_

"Stop holding back!" Ilia's whip came crashing down, forcing Trifa to jump back. "Fight me already!"

"Ilia, please, stop-" Her whip wrapped itself around Trifa's arm, pulling her down to the ground. She hadn't even pulled out her daggers that had been made for her yet.

_Why is Ilia so angry?! _

She had never been like this towards her in the White Fang, never. Ilia had always been rather quiet, but determined to achieve the equality they deserved.

"Ilia, I'm not going to fight you! Just-" She was kicked off the top of the rooftop they were on, but she managed to grab onto a window and swing herself up onto it. Ilia glared down at her.

"You left me all alone!" She leapt off the top of the building, and came crashing into Trifa, knocking both of them down to the ground in a tangle of limbs. Disentangling herself from Ilia, Trifa stood back up.

"Why are you doing this? Don't you realise Adam has corrupted the White Fang?"

"You bloody idiot! Adam has changed, thanks to you and Blake leaving! He's becoming more blood thirsty, more vengeful than he was before!"

"Wasn't he always like that?!" She ducked underneath a whip shot.

"He's taken over the White Fang! He's shaping it, melding it into his own! I'm worried he's going to lead it into ruin!"

"Well, why are we fighting? I could help you take it back!"

"If you truly cared about the White Fang, you would have never left in the first place!" She blasted Trifa in the head with a roundhouse kick, knocking her to the floor once again.

"Ilia-" Ilia cracked her whip against her side.

"You and Blake were two of my best friends and you both left me!"

"We had our reasons! Ilia, please-" She was kicked over onto her back. Ilia leaned over her and raised her whip high, only to be blasted back.

"Stop running like a little coward!"

"No chance Miss Crocodile!" Roman had shot Ilia while continuing to try and wear Tock's semblance down. His constant running was beginning to infuriate Tock.

"Come back-" While sprinting across the road once again, a car had came flying down and rammed into Tock, sending her into the window of a nearby shop, going through it with a almighty crash.

Ilia was getting back up to her feet, and Roman turned around to face her, countering a whip smack.

Trifa raced over to help him, jumping up into the air and blasting Ilia in the face with a kick, sending her staggering, before Roman brought his cane back and swung as hard as he could, but Ilia ducked and wrapped her whip around his legs, bringing Roman to the ground. Trifa grabbed the tail end of Ilia's whip and yanked it forward, bringing Ilia straight into the path of a knee to the gut. Roman quickly hooked his cane around her whip, and dragged it towards him, sending the whip out of her hands and to the side. Ilia tried to make a run for it, and Roman sent out the grappling hook of his cane, grabbing her by her neck, and she went down, desperately clawing at the hook around her throat.

Tock suddenly came out of nowhere, striking Trifa hard in the jaw, and spun her around, driving the hilt of one of her swords into her gut. Trifa was sent sprawling back, and was barely able to bring up her daggers to defend herself as Tock slammed into her. Roman came up behind Tock with a swing, but it missed wildly, and he payed dearly for it, receiving a barrage of strikes to the head and body. Ilia had retrieved her whip and wrapped it round his neck, snapping it back, and if hadn't been for Romans' aura, his neck would probably have been broken. Tock smashed him in the face with the hilt of her sword, and came up high with a kick, which connected. Roman was knocked into the path of a passing car, which crashed into him, and he was left lying on the nearby pathway, motionless and unmoving.

"Roman!" Trifa turned to look at him for a spilt second, and that was the final nail in the coffin. Ilia grabbed her by the back of her neck, and threw her into Tock, who brought her fist down, and uppercutted her in the jaw, which sent her sailing back into Ilia, who planted her boot in her stomach, and she smashed into a nearby building with a thud. Tock came racing over to her and rammed her with her shoulder, before head butting her in the face, and bringing both her swords back, slashed her arms, which cut through her jacket and left a trickle of blood along her arm.

Trifa looked up at Tock's grinning face for a second, before Ilia cracked her whip straight across her face, and it all went black.

_**Do What Do We Best**_

**About twenty minutes later: **

Roman groaned and opened his eyes. He was still lying on the pathway, and several people were gathered around him.

"Is he dead?"

"Should we call the police?"

"Wait, no, look, he's awake!"

Roman looked up at the faces staring down at him. They were young, couldn't be more than teenage age. He sat up and glared at them.

"Would you be so kind and not stare down at a unconscious man?" The group quickly dispersed, still looking at him. He groaned inwardly as he stood up, his back aching.

_What happened? _

Then he remembered, the fight with those two women, and…

_Trifa. Where is she? _

He looked all around him, but couldn't see her anywhere. She was just gone. Silently panicking, he took out his scroll. They had exchanged numbers a while back, and he was praying to every god above that she would pick up. He clicked on the call button, and held it up to his ear. The following seconds felt like a century.

_Come on, come on, pick up damn it! _

But there was nothing. She didn't pick up.

_Okay, this is bad. _

Where could she be? Did those two women get her? And if so, where did they take her? Were they a part of the White Fang? Some other secret organisation he didn't know about?

_No, that's not possible! I'm Roman Freaking Torchwick, I know everything! _At least he liked to think so.

_Think Roman, think, where could they have taken her? _

It was a very likely chance they were a part of the White Fang, and had taken her back to there headquarters. Only problem was, where were there headquarters?

_Did Cinder every tell me where they were hiding out, hell, did one of there members tell me where they were hiding out? _

Back when he was working with the White Fang, they had set up several warehouses and hideouts, but he had never actually visited there official headquarters, their official base of operations. Mainly because he hadn't been that interested. Now though, he was silently kicking himself for not taking more of a interest in how the White Fang operated. Maybe he would've known then.

_Maybe I could have stopped this. _

But it was too late now. He was going to have to figure out where she was, and rescue Trifa, or die trying.

_Oh boy, I used to really hate Faunus, and here I am deciding I want to go save one. _

Had Neo dying softened him up a bit? Is that what it was? Or had he come to the realisation that not all Faunus were a bunch of dirty mutts? Had Trifa made him realise that?

_All questions you can think about another day. Right now, you need to figure out where she is and come to her rescue like a white knight in shining armour._

Maybe he could get a radio and play some loud generic hero music while he flew in on a Griffon, crashing through there base and jumping off magnificently, and do a amazing pose-

_Whoa, whoa, your getting a bit ahead of yourself here. Calm it down. Let's stick to figuring out where the White Fang are first. _

There were loads of people in this town, and one of them were bound to know where the White Fang hid out. All he had to do was look around a little. If he was lucky, Trifa would be saved by the dawn of next day. He did have to act fast though, as he didn't know how the White Fang punished traitors. He would have to hope it wasn't by execution.

_**Do What We Do Best**_

**Super Roman to the rescue! Well, hopefully. If he can find there headquarters, that is. **

**Thanks for reading and have a great day!**


	16. Trapped

**Chapter 16: **

_**Do what we do best **_

Trifa groaned slowly and opened her eyes. _Where… where am I? _She appeared to be in a metal cage of some sort, surrounded by bars. That's when she realised.

She was in a dungeon of some sort. _What? I don't ever remember the White Fang having a dungeon. _

"Finally, you are awake." She stood up and peered through the bars, and was met with the White Fang Lieutenant.

"Where am I? What's happening?"

"You are in a cell. Adam ordered us to design it just for you."

"What's… what's he going to do to me?"

"The same thing he did to Yuma, of course. He's going to kill you. But it would appear that you have gotten lucky. Adam is out at the moment, and he will not be returning for a few days. He would like to kill you personally, so you have a few days to live." No emotion behind those words, nothing at all. Without another word, the Lieutenant stood up and left.

Trifa was in a state of shock. This was really it. This was the end. And she was going to spend the last few days of her life rotting away in this small, cramped cell. Maybe if she just slept a lot, that would make the time go by faster.

_Roman… _

Would he be able to find her in time? Would he come to the rescue? Did he… did he-

_Does he even care? _

His main motivation was survival. That's all he seemed to care about. Saving his own skin. Friends came second.

_But he did save you on the boat…_

Maybe so, but that was different. He could take on a few random guys at a boat. But this was the White Fang he was going up against. A much tougher challenge. He was clever, but he wasn't that clever. No, he wouldn't come. He would lose his life. He was a human, they wouldn't hesitate to kill him.

_Guess I should just make the time go by. _

Sleeping was the only way to do that in this small, cramped cell. Falling back down to the ground, she closed her eyes, and tried her best to drift away. But there was no way that was happening on the hard, cold ground, as stones dug into her back. Wincing, she sat up, and hugged her knees to her chest.

_I can't believe it…_

Once, she might have thought her death would be to save one of her allies, and perhaps they would have made her a martyr for the cause. She would be glorified, maybe even Lionised.

_I was such a self centred person back then… _

But it simply wasn't happening. Instead, she got to die slowly in this cell, until dying for good at the hands of Adam Taurus. Trifa buried her face in her hands, and began to sob softly.

_**Do what we do best **_

_If I were a ex White Fang member, hiding out somewhere, where would I be? _A tricky question for Roman to answer. If this was Vale, all he would have to do is knock over to Junior's bar, pay the man some money, and get all the information he needed. Easy as that.

But unfortunately, this wasn't Vale. This was Mistral. Roman began to rack his mind to see if he could remember any potential ring leaders, any potential gang leaders, anyone who might know some information about the White Fang and their whereabouts.

There was a name that came to him. Lil' Miss Malachite.

_Isn't she the mum of the two girls that Junior had as his bouncers? Melanie and Miltia? _He remembered Junior telling him about there mum once, about how she was a gang leader in Mistral. Okay, so he had a name. Now he had to remember a symbol of some sort, some way to identify them… Nothing came to him.

_Come on! What could it be? _He tried to think back to the few conversations he had shared with Melanie and Miltia, tried to think of anything that could possibly help him find her. All he remembered was him insulting them because they had been beaten up by some blonde girl.

That was before he had then fought said blonde girl in the Paladin, and realised just how absurdly powerful she was. He had never apologised to them though. Then, he remembered something.

_I still have Junior's scroll number, don't I? He's probably not in Vale anymore, but I might be able to get a hold of him. _Checking his scroll, he saw that he indeed still had his scroll number. He pressed the call button.

There was no guarantee that this would work, but it was worth a try. He waited several seconds before it went to voicemail. Inwardly groaning, Roman then left a voicemail.

"Hey Junior, call me back as soon as possible. This is important."

Until he got back to him, Roman saw no other way he could figure out where the White Fang headquarters were. He was just going to have to hope Junior got back as quick as possible.

_Maybe this is all pointless… _

Maybe she was already dead. Maybe Adam had already killed her. Maybe-

_You have to at least try. _

Resigning himself to that, he continued to think. Think about something that would maybe lead him to the White Fang, maybe lead him to Lil Miss. But still nothing. It was so frustrating he wanted to scream. But screaming wouldn't get him anywhere.

Roman continued to grumble to himself as he paced backwards and forwards. He found himself thinking about Trifa, not Neo surprisingly.

_I used to really hate Faunus, yet here I am, worrying about one, thinking about one. _How that sudden change in character had happened was a complete mystery to him. Or was it even a change in character? Did he really hate Faunus? Or was it only the White Fang he hated? He really did not know at this point.

And the one Faunus he had been friends with-

_Was friends with. Darn it Torchwick, she could still be alive, get a hold of yourself! _

She wasn't even a awesome animal, like a tiger or a lion, man eating predators who wrecked havoc. She was a spider, a wiggly, disgusting thing which he could kill with a simple flick of his finger.

_Spiders...Spiders... Spiders! _

Trifa was a spider Faunus, he had known that for ages. So why was it suddenly setting off all sorts of alarm bells in his head? A very vague memory suddenly returned to him. A conversation with Junior.

_Lil Miss refers to all the people who work for her as spiders. It's quite odd actually. They all have tattoos of them..._

That was it! Spiders! Roman had never been the fondest of Junior, he was mainly just a contact, but in that moment, he could have never been more thankful for him. He had a symbol, a way to identify them. Now, he had to find a member of her gang, and demand that they take him to her. Once he was there, he would then have to pray she knew where the White Fang Headquarters were, or he was utterly screwed. Well, Trifa was utterly screwed.

He fingered for his wallet. He knew some gang leaders, and he also knew that they usually wanted money for information. Pulling it out, he counted through the lien. He grimaced. Not a lot left. Hopefully, that wouldn't be a big problem. He could easily pickpocket someone and get a bit extra.

_Okay, time to find a gang leader._

_**Do what we do best **_

"Get up." Neo stuck her tongue out at Qrow. "Don't make me grab you by the throat and force you to."

Neo was lying on the ground, and Qrow had very reluctantly agreed to bring her along with them. Ruby had insisted that they didn't kill her. Quite ironic, considering Neo wanted to stab her in the back of her head. She was making sure to piss him off as much as humanly possible.

"Listen brat, if you don't stop sticking your tongue out at me, I'll rip it out for you!"

"Uncle Qrow!"

"What? Why is she even coming with us? We should just leave her to die."

"You know we can't do that." Jaune said. "If it helps ease your nerves, you can be the one to watch her."

"Your damn right I will be." Qrow grabbed her by the arm and roughly pulled her to her feet. "Let's go then psychopath."

Neo tried to kick him in the shin, but he raised his foot and stomped it down as hard as he could. She bit her lip hard.

"Don't test me." He hissed under his breath. "I'm only keeping you alive because Ruby told me to, got it? And she's already told me about your shattering trick on the airship, so don't you dare even try it."

Neo rolled her eyes at how unbelievably dramatic he was being. If he was a bird at this moment in time, he'd probably be flapping his wings and cawing very angrily. She still had Roman's hat, perched on her head.

They started to walk down the pathway. Neo hadn't given much thought to where they were, but it appeared to be a forest of some sort. Qrow still had her by the arm, pulling her roughly along.

She thought back to what the blonde boy, who's name she couldn't remember-

_Jean? Jin? Jane? _

That didn't really matter now. What did matter was that he had seen her cry. He had seen her in a moment of weakness. And if he dared even mention to any of his little friends, she would kill all of them. Because no matter how watchful Bird Man thought he was, he would have a very hard time watching her when she drove a blade into his back. She could break out of his grasp and she could kill them all. It was just a matter of time.

But for now, she would have to make do with annoying them as much as possible. She purposefully dragged her feet as Bird Man pulled her along, "tripped" on a rock, and gave anyone who dared look at her a death stare.

Ruby suddenly fell back so she was walking alongside her. Neo stared at the girls silver eyes, and wished to put the heel of her boot into one of them. Her parasol may have been lost, but she could still kill Little Red if she wanted too.

"I didn't kill him you know." Neo looked at her, not sure she had heard her right. "It was a Grimm. He began yelling about how cold and ruthless the world was, and his negativity drew a Grimm to him, and he was eaten alive."

Neo spat at her. _Lies. You killed him and I know you did. And when I get the chance, I'm going to kill you too. _

"You don't believe me, do you?" Neo turned her gaze away from her, and onto the road ahead. Then, a sudden thought struck her.

_What will you do when you kill Ruby and Cinder? _That was a problem. Because, without Roman, what did she really have to live for? Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

So what was she going to do? Sit on the street and be depressed? Become a assassin for hire? A criminal mastermind? What was she going to do? She didn't know. She honestly didn't know. A pant of sadness went through her, and she didn't resist anymore as Qrow pulled her along.

_**Do what we do best **_

**And more Neo to make you all sad. I'm such a lovely person. **

**Anyway, thanks for reading and have a good day!**


	17. Manipulation

**Chapter 17: Manipulation**

"_Daddy, why do the humans hate us so much?" Trifa hung on to her father's arm like he was the last thing connecting her to this world. "Did we do something wrong?" _

"_I don't know sweetie. I really don't know." _

"_What about Mummy? Is she going to be okay?" Heart attack, that is what is the doctors had said. Her father didn't reply. _

_The hospital smelled of death, it's white walls looming over the top of her. And with so many humans walking about, she felt extremely vulnerable, especially when the humans would throw a disapproving look at her. _

_A tall man wearing a hat and his family walked over to where they were sitting. "Move, Faunus." Trifa stared up at him. Her father sighed. _

"_Come on Trifa, let's go." He said, standing up. But Trifa didn't budge. _

"_Did you not hear me Spider Girl? Move." The human said. _

"_Trifa…" Her father's tone held a note of warning in it. But she didn't care. _

"_What, are you deaf or something you little brat? Good for nothing Faunus! Move it!" He reached out to try and force her off, but she drew back her hand and slapped him in the face as hard as she could. He recoiled back, and stared at Trifa, who had realised that she had made a very big mistake, and was now shielding herself in case he tried to hit her back. _

"_Alright then little missy, if that's how it's going to be-" Her father came to the rescue, putting himself between his daughter and the man. _

"_Sir, I apologise for my daughter's behaviour, but please-" The man struck her father, knocking him to the ground. _

"_Dirty animals! Faunus like you shouldn't even be allowed to come into places like these!" He kicked him. "The very nerve of-" _

"_Leave my dad alone!" _

_The man spun around as a web latched itself onto his arm. Trifa didn't have any plan for what she was going to do with said web, it was a action performed in a outbreak of anger. The man stared disgustingly down at it, ripped it off his arm, and keeping a hold of it, yanked it towards him, sending Trifa tumbling to the floor, and she stopped right in front of the man, who punched her in the face. _

"_Useless! Absolutely useless mutts! Animals who should be our slaves! No wonder your kind gets thrown in dust mines! You will never amount to anything!" His fist came slamming down once again… _

Trifa woke up, gasping. She had been crying for so long last night that she must have just fallen asleep from exhaustion. When she looked to the cell door, she noticed that someone was standing there. A certain crocodile Faunus.

"You were crying in your sleep." Tock said. "Bad dream?"

"What do you want? And how long have you been standing there?!"

"About five minutes. See, I've been told that I need to keep an eye on you to make sure you don't try and get out."

_Great. Now I have to spend the last few days of my life listening to the Tick Tock Crocodile waffle on._

"You know, you and that Torchwick guy put up one hell of a fight. I must admit, I was kind of impressed."

Trifa turned and looked at Tock. She was standing just outside the cell door, looking in, with that bloody smile on her face. It was pissing Trifa off to no end.

"Look, if your just here to taunt me, then stop wasting your time."

Tock threw her hands out in front of her in a over-exaggerated gesture. "I just complimented you! I just said you put up one hell of a fight! If your going to be all grouchy and moody, well, fine then."

"I think I have a right to be grouchy and moody, considering I'm going to die when Adam gets back."

"So negative. Who knows, he might skip his way in because he's in a really good mood, and decide not to kill you! He might even decide to let you back in to the White Fang! Wouldn't that be great?"

"No" Trifa put her back to the wall and slid down to the floor. "It really wouldn't be great. It would be terrible actually."

"Speaking of which love, why did you leave the White Fang in the first place? You wouldn't be in this situation right now if you hadn't left."

_What's the point? I'm going to die anyway, might as well tell her. _

"They were becoming far too violent. At one point, I would not have minded that, but it was when we jumped onto a train and began to kill people, and I let a young boy escape because I just didn't have the heart to kill him. Then, my friend Yuma, he decided to try and run away, but the Lieutenant tracked him down and brought him to Adam, who then killed him."

"Sheesh. And I thought I was bad in terms of killing people, but Adam just sounds like a psychopath."

Trifa let out a choked laugh. "You can say that again."

"You know, I'm not really in this for Faunus equality, or to strive for a better world for them, I just think the money's good. Bounty hunter code and all that."

"Wonderful. I don't care."

"Dearie me, so rude. I suppose it's understandable, considering you are going to die in a few days."

"Thanks for reminding me. I just love knowing that I am going to die in a few days."

"And so sarcastic too. You're a bit like me."

"I am nothing like you. I am not a crocodile Faunus, I am a spider Faunus." Trifa began counting it out on her fingers. "You've unlocked your semblance, I haven't. You're a bounty hunter, I'm not. You have a really bad taste in hairstyle, I don't."

"Alright, alright Little Miss I'm So Smart, I get it." Tock rolled her eyes. "You don't need to try and prove that your clever or anything."

Trifa didn't say anything, and began tracing her finger up and down the wall.

"If your really bored, then we could play Tic Tac Toe." Trifa looked at Tock.

"What?"

"There's a couple of stones lying about in there." She motioned to the floor. "And when you scrape a stone against the wall…" She picked one up and scraped it on the wall. "There's a white line that is formed on the wall. See?" There was indeed a white line on the wall. "Now, if you don't want to, that's fine as well. But trust me, I'm as bored as you are. Gives us something both to do."

_Playing Tic Tac Toe is not something your supposed to do with your captor. Oh, why not? _

"Fine then. How do you plan to get in here?"

"I've been given a key. I can get in there. So long as you promise not to try and knock me out and steal the key. Not that you would get very far if you tried that."

"Alright. I promise."

_Why am I doing this? _

"Good stuff." Tock unlocked the cell door and stepped in. "So, who is going first?"

_**Do what we do best **_

_Found you. _Roman had managed to find what he thought was a few members of Lil Miss Malachite's crew.

_Spider tattoo on there arms? Check. Weird purple clothes? That wasn't on the agenda, but check anyway. _They were standing outside a parked van, laughing and talking with one another. Roman had managed to sneak some more lien off a unsuspecting local in case the price for information was a little higher than he anticipated.

"Yeah, so you know what he said to me? He said that-"

_Now, how do I do this? _

He essentially had two options. He could either politely walk up to them, ask if they could take him there, and see what they said. Threatening them wouldn't earn any popularity points with Lil Miss, but if they refused to take him there, it may very well be necessary.

Alternatively, he could try and sneak into the back of the van when they weren't looking. A much more fun option, but also a higher risk of getting caught.

_Guess we're going with the first option then. _

He came out from behind the building he was standing behind, and began whistling loudly as he walked over to them. They turned around and looked at him.

"Can we help you with something?"

"Greetings gentlemen. Ladies. I have but a small favour to ask of you."

They shared glances with one another. "What… kind of a favour?"

"Not much. I just need you to take me to Lil Miss Malachite."

They were definitely on edge now. There hands went to the various guns, knives, that they had on them.

_Why are they getting so violent? I'm only asking! _

"What do you need to speak to her about?" One of them asked.

_And now there sticking their noses into my business. Absolutely fantastic. _

"Just a little something. I do not mean to be rude, but it really isn't your business."

"Should we take him there?" One of them muttered. Roman inwardly sighed.

_I'm I going to have to bribe them? _He really didn't want to, but it appeared he may have no choice. Just as he was about to whip out some lien…

"Okay, we'll take you there. But there's no room in the front, you'll have to sit in the back."

"Oh, really? Come on, can't you spare a seat?"

"Sorry, either you sit in the back, or we don't take you there."

"How about I drive? Will that work? Just tell me where it is and I'll drive us there." All of a sudden, he began to get a tingling feeling throughout his entire body. It caught him off guard.

_What, what is that? Why I'm I… _

"Well, I suppose we could do that. Don't see a problem with it."

_But he just said a second ago… _

"But didn't you just say…" It appeared the other's were confused as well.

"Alright, we'll do that then. Hop on in."

"Who's going to sit in the back then?"

"I will."

_What? Why? _Then again, why was he complaining?

"Alright everyone, jump on in." Roman said, climbing into the drivers seat. He looked down at his hand for a moment, and could have sworn he thought it was glowing slightly.

"Okay, so tell me where her place is then?"

"Pull out onto that road there-"

For once in his life, Roman actually listened to the instructions he was being given and didn't just do his own thing. A regrettable sacrifice, but a necessary one if he was going to save Trifa. He was still wondering why he had suddenly managed to convince the guy that it was a good idea for him to drive. And why did he think his hand was glowing slightly?

_Was it my semblance? Did I literally just unlock it? Would have been handy to unlock it the thousands of times it could have been useful before this one, but sure, no big deal. _What even was his semblance then? Manipulation? The power of "Don't care what you want, do what I want?" One thing was for certain though, it would come in very useful.

The people sitting with him didn't seem to want to have a chat, so they drove on in silence.

Eventually, they told him to stop. When he got out, Roman immediately noticed that there was a symbol of a spider on one of the pillars outside.

"This way." They lead him through a alleyway and into a room. It was your classic gang hideout. There were people sitting, talking, drinking and laughing.

"She's at the front there." The man next to him pointed at a…

_Oh dearie me, what species of whale is that? Little Miss? More like Little I like to False Advertise Miss._

The women was quite big, and considering she was currently eating a small ice cream with a spoon, it wasn't hard for Roman to figure out why. He began walking towards her.

_Alright then fatso, let's talk. _

_**Do what we do best**_

**Thanks for reading and have a good day! **


	18. The Whale of Mistral's Underground

**Chapter 18: The Whale of Mistral's Underground**

"That's far enough." Lil Miss, or Big Whale Miss as Roman was now going to mentally refer to her as, said.

"I assume you would be Lil Miss Malachite?"

"I'm going to be Lil Miss Gonna Skin You Alive if you ever take that tone with me again."

_Tone? What tone? I was simply asking a question. Okay, so she's a whale, and she's a big dumb whale at that. Got ya. _

But he didn't say that out loud. As much fun as it would have been to see this big whale flopping about angrily, he couldn't afford to make her angry if he was going to find Trifa.

She was giving him a look that suggested she wanted something. Standing either side of her were…

_Melanie and Militia? Aren't they supposed to be with Junior? _

But it was whatever. He wasn't in the mood to chat, he just wanted the information and then he wanted to leave. 

"How about we talk first and then I'll pay?"

"You're a fool if you think I'm going to fall for that."

He took out his wallet, fingered out some lien, walked over and set it down.

"Happy now?"

"Certainly. What do you want for it?" The Malachite Twins crossed there arms.

_How to be intimidating 101. Cross your arms._

"I need information on the White Fang's whereabouts."

"The White Fang you say?"

"Yes, that's what I said." He began tapping his cane impatiently on the floor.

"And why do you want to know about them if you don't mind me asking? I've been asked about people's whereabouts, but the White Fang? That's a new one."

"Look here, I really don't have time to have a chat. Do you know where they are or do you not?"

"Why the impatience? Do you need to be somewhere?"

"Yes, I do actually. So, are you going to keep wasting my time, or are you going to tell me?" The realisation that Trifa was actually in serious danger and the fact that he needed to get to the headquarters now had put him in a very impatient mood.

"I am actually interested in something. After the Fall of Beacon, I heard you were dead Roman Torchwick. How did you manage to survive?"

"Look lady, if you wanted to ask me questions, you should have brought money of your own. Now, I am going to ask this one more time. And I better get a answer. Where are the White Fang headquarters?" Melanie and Militia had uncrossed their arms and taken a step forward.

"You are in no position to threaten me." She was very calm, which just served to piss Roman off even more.

"This is your last chance before I blow your head off." Roman set his cane on the table and held up five fingers. "You have five seconds. Five, four…"

"Hey! Back off!" Melanie said. They had both began to walk towards Torchwick.

"Well then Torchwick, you seem to be in quite the hurry."

Roman gave her a hard cold glare. "I paid you the money, and you seemed to want to waste more time asking me questions."

"Well, since you decided to threaten me, I think our business is done here." She flicked a hand towards him. "Get him out of here."

"Come on! Move-" Melanie didn't even get to finish her sentence before Roman grabbed her by the arm and yanked her forward, kneeing her in the gut. Militia rushed him, and he ducked underneath her and whacked her with his cane.

_I can't beat both of them. _

They were expert martial artists, and it was two versus one. His best bet was to get to there mum and that would make them stop dead in there tracks if he put his cane to her head. At least he hoped so.

The people who had been sitting at the tables, drinking amongst other things suddenly got up and began to look at the fight which was going on.

Melanie spun around and tried to drive her bladed heel into his head, but he parried it, and was forced to take a step back when Militia went for his leg with her claws. Roman was able to gain a upper hand over Militia when she came in far too close, giving him a opportunity to block her strike and bring his cane up, spinning it in a overhead arc, and slamming it into her face, while Melanie rushed in from the side, and he turned his cane around and fired, a clear shot which sent her flying into a nearby table. He grabbed Militia's hand when she attempted to strike him again, and put his cane to her body and fired once again, and she smashed into a table as well.

_This is my chance. _

He rushed over to where Lil Miss was sitting, and she seemed shocked that he had been able to disarm her daughters so easily. He put his cane to her head.

"Somebody in here better tell me where the White Fang are, or I'll blow her head off!"

The whole room fell silent. No one spoke for a long moment. Then Lil Miss spoke up.

"I do know where they are. I'll tell you if you take your cane away from my head."

"Like that's going to happen. I take this away, and your daughters will be right on my case. Tell me where they are, now."

He pushed his cane further into her face. She looked up at him for a second.

"Fine then. If you insist. I was planning to tell you anyway, but then you decided to attack me."

"Hurry up. This kind of small talk is the exact reason I threatened you."

She reached into her pocket, and drew out a small piece of paper. Roman snatched it up, glanced at it, and stuffed it into his own pocket. He slowly backed away from her, keeping the barrel of Melodic Cugel pointed at her. Nobody made a noise as he walked towards the door that had lead him into this place, and slowly pushed it open.

"I can't say it's been a pleasure Little Fat Miss." With that final comment, he pushed open the door and stepped outside.

He took another look at the piece of paper before walking down the pathway, planning to get there as quickly as possible.

_**Do what we do best **_

"I win again." Tock stated. Trifa inwardly moaned to herself as her totally unbeatable strategy of putting the X in the corner first failed yet again.

"Dearie me, your not very good at this, are you?"

"Well done Miss detective Croc. You truly are extremely intelligent."

"And well done Miss sarcastic spider. You truly are going for the record of "Who can make the most sarcastic remarks in under a minute."

"I love you Tock. I love you so much right now. I just love sitting in this cell, knowing that at any moment, Adam Taurus is going to walk in here and demand that I lay my head down on the ground as he gets to cut it off. Isn't that so much fun?"

"Hmm, no, I don't think it would be."

"Great job once again." Trifa clapped her hands together mockingly. "You have just figured out that getting your head cut off is not at all fun, because it means that you are dead. Alternatively, he could stab me in the chest. Or in the eye. Or-"

"Or he could maybe not stab you at all, and instead decide he's going to knock you down the ground, and then take his sheath out and blast you in the face with until your dead."

"No. He will definitely stab me. That's how Adam kills people. And my aura will probably protect me from the first stabbing, and so he'll have to do it again. And again, and again, cracking exceptionally worse puns each time." Trifa stood up and began mimicking Adam stabbing someone.

"I think she got the point! Aren't you on edge right now? Knife to meet you! Don't worry, she's in stable condition!"

Tock chuckled. "I must admit, he doesn't strike me as the sort of person who would do that."

"He doesn't strike me as anything but a crazed man who will do anything to get what he wants."

"Well, now that he's overthrown Sienna, the White Fang will basically become even more of a violent organisation than it was before."

"But this isn't the right way. It took me far too long to realise it, but violence isn't the answer." Tock looked up at her. "By attacking human's, by doing all this, we are only making them far more hateful and resentful of us. And by killing their families, they will only fight back harder and possibly wipe us out."

Trifa sighed. "Ghira Belladonna was right all along. Adam will only lead the White Fang into ruin. There has to be more people like me, more people who have realised that this isn't right, more people who are willing to leave the organisation and fight for equality in a different way. I want the human's to respect us, not fear us."

"You were a part of Sienna's White Fang love. You must have thought violence was the way once."

"I did. But what does it even matter anymore? This is just a pathetic end to a pathetic life. I can only hope that Adam will make it quick…"

Tock stood up and slowly opened the cell door. "Anyway, my shift is over now. The next guard will be coming to keep a eye on you in a few minutes. Don't try and escape in that time." She closed it over and locked it before turning and leaving, whistling loudly and swinging the key round her finger.

Trifa just wanted Adam to hurry up already. If he wanted to kill her himself, it was extremely stupid of him to leave literally right before she was thrown in here. It's not like she had any chance of escaping. The metal bars were too strong, and the walls had no noticeable cracks she could try and break. She was stuck in here, counting down the clock to her ultimate death.

She looked up as the next guard entered the room, a man with glasses on top of his Grimm mask as well as a floppy dog ears. He didn't say anything as he took up his post.

"Hey there Perry." He turned around and looked at her for a brief moment before speaking.

"You shouldn't have left Trifa. Then you wouldn't be in this situation."

_So someone else who is going to lecture me on how great and awesome the White Fang is. Sorry, but I'm not interested. _

She laid her head back against the wall and resumed waiting. "You know I had my reasons for leaving, right?"

"I'm sure you did. But were they really worth the risk of being hunted down and brought back to Adam? I don't think so."

"How is Sienna doing?" She asked suddenly. "Did she leave after being overthrown?"

"No, she is still here, still a part of the White Fang. Why do you ask?"

"Just wondering." She picked up a small rock and threw it across the room. "What about Ilia?"

"Last I checked, Ilia was one of the people who brought you here, so she is still very much a part of the White Fang."

"No way Mister Clever." Trifa rolled her eyes. Unlike Tock, Perry didn't throw her sarcasm back at her, and instead just chose to ignore her.

_Let's at least hope I get to speak to Ilia before I die… _

_**Do what we do best **_

***Insert quote about Adam being a edge lord here* **

**Thanks for reading and have a good day! **


	19. Arrival

**If your wondering why this hasn't been updated in so long, a more detailed explanation will be provided at the bottom. But do not fear, for I, RelightTheTorch, have descended upon a Griffon to give you all another Do What We Do Best Chapter! **

**Chapter 19: **

_Hurry up Adam, hurry up Adam, hurry up… _

Trifa just wanted it to end. The waiting was just becoming agonising at this point. She had been told Adam was "out at the moment". Where ever he was, he was certainly taking his sweet time.

_Maybe he's dead. _That would be nice. Maybe he had attempted to go to Atlas and the military had cut him down. Unlikely, but nice to think about.

"Perry, where did Adam actually go?" She asked out loud. "Is he due to come back soon?"

Perry shrugged. "I know he went to do something in Atlas, but-"

_Atlas? So he's going after the Schnees then. _Only logical explanation.

"-but I'm not entirely sure what he is doing."

"He's going after the Schnee Dust Company, if I had to take a guess. But how would he even get in? Isn't Atlas surrounded by all sorts of security stuff?"

"I believe so."

_So he's really stupid then. _How in the world did he think he was going to do this? Did he even know how he was going to get to the Schnees? What plan could possibly beat the Atlas military?

"Perry, you don't think you could let me out, could you?"

"No."

Ah well, it was worth a try. Trifa's boredom was at its peak. Perry hadn't even bothered to ask if she wanted to play Tic Tac Toe, like Tock had.

_Tock… _Who was she exactly? Why had she joined up with Adam? What did she have to gain out of it? It was all very confusing. And then there was Ilia, who Trifa hadn't seen since being thrown in here.

Quite frankly, Trifa didn't really care what Ilia thought of her at this point. She was going to die anyway, was there any need to stress about it?

Lying back down, Trifa began to grumble to herself about Adam, and the White Fang, and the amount of time she had been in here. Couldn't Adam please hurry up?

Then, she had a idea. A idea for how she could possibly break out of here. It was crazy, it was mad, and it was extremely dangerous, but it could work. The whole reason Trifa hadn't tried something like this before was because Tock had been there, and she wouldn't have fallen for it, and she was much more skilled than Trifa was. However, in terms of Perry, it could work on him.

Very slowly, she stood back up, and walked over to the bars of the cell. She stuck her hand through them.

"Come on now Perry, don't you think you could let me out for just a little bit? I promise, I won't cause any trouble."

"Do you really think I'm going to fall for that? I'm not stupid Trifa."

"Well, could you come over here for a second?"

"You must think I'm dumb. The second I come over there, your going to bash my head off the bars."

"No, why would I do that? We were friends, right? I would never do that to a friend."

"I don't think we were friends."

"Course we were! Do you not remember all our conversations about…"

Her mind blanked. What had she and Perry talked about? This plan of her's wasn't working out very well.

"Uh, we talked about, like, Adam! Yeah, we talked about Adam!"

"Literally everyone in the White Fang talks about Adam, Trifa."

_Darn it. _He was good. She couldn't remember anything else he had talked with her about, probably because they had barely talked at all. Trying to convince him she was friends with him to get him to come over had been the plan, but unfortunately, it wasn't going to work. Then, another idea popped into her head.

_Maybe if I piss him off, he'll get really mad and come over. _It was unlikely, but it could maybe work.

"You know, I really don't like the White Fang."

"I could have guessed that from the fact you left."

"Not just that, but Adam too. All he is a edgy boy who got sad one day and decided he was going to kill everything and everyone."

"What are you implying?"

"Isn't it obvious? He's not a good leader. I can't believe I thought he was doing the right thing. He's just a angry goat who is pissed off because his girlfriend left. He's so obsessed with Blake, I'm not even sure he cares about the Faunus at all."

"His obsession with Blake may be a bit of a problem, yes, but I believe in him. I think he's doing what he believes is right."

"Don't you think he's taken it way too far? With the whole violence thing? All he does is swing his sword around, yelling at the top of his lungs that all the human's are going to die. There's no plan, no strategy, it's just "Die humans, die!"

"I respect Ghira and his more peaceful ways, but this is the only way we are going to get what we want." Perry had turned his back on the staircase behind him that lead up into the rest of the headquarters. "You want to know something Trifa? I was saddened by the fact that you left. I may have not known you all that well, but that didn't mean it didn't sadden me."

All of a sudden, Trifa thought she heard something. She didn't know what it was, but she could have sworn it was there.

"With every Faunus that turns their back on the White Fang, that is one less person to help fight for our cause. And one person can make a huge difference."

Then, someone emerged from behind Perry, moving stealthily along. Trifa couldn't get a good look at who it was, but she thought she saw a glint of bright orange hair in the dark. Perry still hadn't seen them.

"You could have been that person. You could have lead us to a better future. You could have been a revolutionary, just like Adam. If only you had-" Perry didn't get a chance to say another word as he was suddenly grabbed around the throat, and began to struggle as someone pulled him back. The White Fang hadn't bothered installing lights down in their quickly made dungeon, so Trifa couldn't see the commotion, but she could hear it, and it ended a second later.

Trifa held her breath. Who was this? Had they come to save her? Finish her off? Then, the figure walked towards the bars of cell.

"Well Archane, you've got yourself in a bit of bother, haven't you?"

Only one person she knew called her Archane. Emerging out of the darkness, bowler hat on top of head, cane in hand, was Roman Torchwick.

She didn't speak. She couldn't speak. He had come. He had actually come for her. After all his talk about surviving, after all his talk about looking out for his own skin, he had come. How he had got in here was a different matter altogether, but he was here, right in front of her.

Trifa pinched herself to make sure this wasn't some hallucination the lack of good food and water had brought on. It wasn't. Roman was actually here.

"Don't tell me you've gone mute. Last thing I need is another mute friend."

_Friend… _He did care. That's why he had come. He cared.

"Roman…" She watched as he took the key out of Perry's pocket, and slotted it into the lock, and the door opened.

"Now, come on. Those goons I had to knock out to get here are going to be waking up soon." He turned around and began to walk back up the staircase. Trifa followed after them.

"With any luck, no one will have noticed that they've been taken out." Roman had dropped his voice to a whisper as he poked his head out and looked around. He slowly took a step out, and beckoned for Trifa to follow. After they had both got out, Trifa peeked round a corner and saw a row of White Fang, lying on the ground.

"This way." He lead her down a corridor, and Trifa didn't really need him to lead her, she remembered this place. Remembered everything about it, every little nook, every little cranny. She knew enough to know that a exit wasn't too far away. Then she would be out. With Roman.

Roman suddenly stopped as the sounds of voices could be heard.

"When do you think Adam's going to come back?"

"Is he dead?"

"No, no, he's stronger than that."

Roman ducked behind a corner, and motioned for Trifa to do the same. Instead, she held up a finger and pointed it to the guys as they walked around the corner, backs turned. Trifa very slowly began to make her way forward, and after peeking around a corner to ensure that no one would see the two men being taken out, she darted out, and came up behind the two of them, shooting two webs out and pulling them to the floor, before bringing her knee down, knocking one out, and punching the other one. She jerked her head backwards down the corridor, where she knew there was a door that would lead them out. Roman nodded, and the two of them advanced down the hallway. Luckily, they only came across one other person, who Roman dispatched with a simple swing from Melodic Cugel.

After pushing open the door, Trifa was free. Out of the stuffy dungeon and back into the cool air of Mistral.

"That was a lot easier than expected." Roman commented. "I was expecting us to have to fight our way out. I was expecting Adam to be there, or Sienna, or that crocodile girl, or your chameleon friend. I shouldn't be complaining, should I?"

She looked at him. Even now, she still couldn't believe he had come.

"Oh! Here, I found these." He reached into his coat pockets and drew out her two knife revolvers, and held them out. "I'm surprised they didn't take them as well." She took them, and put them away. They looked at each other for a long moment. Roman then sighed heavily and spread out his arms.

"Alright then, bring it in."

Trifa stepped forward and wrapped her arms around him. "I didn't think you were going to come. I thought, I thought…"

"That I was just going to leave you there?"

"Well, I guess."

"Trust me, I'm as surprised as you are that I decided to come. I guess after Neo died…"

Trifa gently patted him on the back. She had never known Neo, but it was clear Roman had cared about her a lot.

"Thank you so much."

Roman let out a low chuckle and broke away from her. "Your welcome. Don't forget, you owe me one now."

Trifa smiled at him and nodded her head. "I'll keep that in mind."

_**Do What We Do Best**_

**So, why did I just disappear? Well, to put it simply, I'm writing my own original story, and I've been working on it a lot lately. I'm still not entirely sure whether I actually want to go through the trouble of trying to get it published, or just upload it to a website like , except for original stories of course. **

**Not that'll I have to worry about that for a while anyway. I'm only on Chapter 2. **

**Anyway, thanks for reading and have a good day! **


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